COLD GROUND
by Sefirosukuraodo
Summary: Two years have gone by since the Barbershop Killer's chaos has settled. Norman Jayden finds the family life growing stale as time goes by, but when his past straps him to a chair for torture he has no choice but to fall back into his old habits. JARS M/M
1. Chapter 1: Skinny Love

WARNING: This story is a sequel to HEAVY INFERNO; if you'd like to understand half of the plot of COLD GROUND, you may want to read that first d(^_^)b

1. Skinny Love

Monday. April showers brought flooded streets to the city; water flowed through the gutters like sand through an hourglass. Unfortunately, time wasn't going by as fast as I would have liked it to. I pulled my truck to a stop and flipped through the envelopes in the plastic box in the seat beside me. Evelyn Waugh, Evelyn Waugh… I gathered all of Evelyn's mail and stuck it inside of her mailbox. I pulled the truck forward one house, and flipped through the box for the next set of envelopes.

My days weren't usually so glum, in fact most days I was more than happy with my job. But today were the days when I had a hard case of the Muddy Blues – the days when I wonder why I bother getting up in the morning. Norman Jayden, masculine FBI profiler and mean brawler was known far and wide by his peers, respected and looked up to. Somewhere over the last three years, being dragged along the salty trails, he'd been reduced to being me; Norman Jayden, mailman and part-time chauffer for 'tweens. I wondered what the Jayden three years ago would say if he could see me now.

Days like today I just shoved the mail in the mailbox and drove on by without even glancing anyone's way.

By the time I made it home through traffic and lights, Ethan usually had dinner ready on the table and Shaun was taking a homework break. If nothing else, we all ate dinner together every night like a famn damily. Ethan was always smiles for me, even through the tired bags beneath his eyes. Shaun was fourteen now, and more secretive than ever – such was the world of a teenage boy.

We ate, and then Shaun would hole up in his room as Ethan and I would catch up and watch some boring TV program on the National Geographic Channel while he snuggled up against me. Then he'd start dozing, I'd tell him to go to bed but he'd persist that he wasn't nodding off until he finally gave in an hour later and we stumbled groggily into the bedroom.

Lather, rinse, repeat. That had become my life now. Well, _our_ life. I had everything I wanted and more – Ethan, Shaun, a steady job, a home. And yet, as lucky as had been to have all of that and more, I wasn't happy. No, happy's not the word I should be using because Ethan really did made me happy – I think what I'm trying to say is that I feel… like I'm living someone else's life, not mine. This whole 'family man' suit I'm wearing still feels itchy; the family world still so alien. When Ethan and I went to a parent-teacher meeting (because he insisted I go as one of Shaun's parents even though I told him I didn't want to) I felt so out of place. The stares and awkward small talk we got from other parents didn't help ease the unsettling feeling in the pit of my stomach.

I was bored, plain and simple. Ethan and I had come to a sort of rut. Oh, I loved him to death and couldn't imagine being alone, let alone with anyone else. We still fit together like two halves of a whole, and it never stopped feeling 'right' when we were wrapped up in each other, but somehow it felt like we'd been at a standstill for a few months now, going nowhere.

But where was there left to go? We had a house in a great neighborhood, we had mutual friends, and we had our careers – well, Ethan's career and the job I'd settled on at the advice of my therapist. We'd planted roots, we'd built a life and a pretty fucking spectacular one at that. We'd made it despite odds and people who rooted against us. But all that glitters isn't gold, and I wondered where we were going, if anywhere.

That was my problem; I'd lost momentum. I was completely stuck in one spot in every aspect of life. Ethan had noticed as well, but since he was still hurtling forward and sky-rocketing as an architect he still had the comfort of knowing that he was still moving in some aspect. I was damn jealous of Ethan, though I wouldn't ever tell him that. He would just take it the wrong way if I did. I didn't even like admitting that fact to myself. I was supposed to support and stand by my partner through thick and thin, and her I was envying his rising career and the paths set out before him.

The next day I drove Shaun to school and then headed into work. Once off, I went home and changed out of my little blue-grey uniform (I still couldn't get used to the shorts) and ate dinner with my family. Then Ethan and I watched TV, I urged him for most of the evening to go to bed until he finally did and that was that. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, all the same.

Saturday that was some little get-together at one of the neighbors' houses. Cheap wine and joke killers, that's what the evening consisted of. But I laughed at these bad jokes, of course, for Ethan's sake. These things were important to him for some reason. I just didn't get it. I liked half the people on our block less than half as they deserved while he liked half the people on our block more than twice as much as they deserved to be. But that was the man I'd (sort of) married; Saint Fucking Ethan. Perfectly charming, charitable, and excessively handsome. Even after living with him for two years it still boggles me to think that any human could be that humane, and yet there he was.

I had to step outside to get some fresh air. The cool night breezes did help get the smell of middle-aged high brow wannabes out of my hair, but it was a short lived victory when Ethan walked outside with a stern look on his face that I'd seen before; clearly he was not happy with my performance.

"What's wrong?" He asked.

"Nothing, I just needed some air – go back inside, enjoy the party," I said dismissively.

"I'd rather go back inside with you," he said. Those bright puppy eyes were boring into my soul, and I couldn't stay frustrated for much longer. Ethan walked down the front steps and placed his arms around my neck as my hands habitually found his waist. "Just come inside, sit down, and join the conversation."

"What conversation? They've been talking about that bottle of wine for the last twenty minutes," I groaned. Wine was a farce. They thought it tasted chocolaty, blackberry flavors accentuation the rich texture with an oaky finish: I thought it tasted like sulfur and hate.

Ethan and I had this thing, this sort of dance. I would be frustrated or peeved about something and feeling particularly argumentative. He would try and talk me into something that I didn't want to do. He'd place his arms on my shoulders, I'd grab his waist, and eventually we'd end up slowly rotating and swaying from side to side like a couple of prom kids. I didn't know how he did it – he was a magician that way. I'd try to start and argument and we'd end up dancing under the stars with smiles on both of our mouths.

"Just come back inside with me. We'll stay for another half hour at most and then I promise we'll go home," he said. I hung my head and peaked up into his eyes sparingly, shaking my head with a sigh.

"I don't know how you do it," I said.

Ethan chuckled and it was still the best sound in the world to me. I lifted my head to meet his gaze, and he leaned in to lock his lips to mine. I could still taste the wine on his lips, and though bitter in flavor, it was still sweeter than the purest sugar when mixed with the natural taste of his taut, tender skin.

That night I was stirred from a deep sleep by Ethan's whimpers and murmurs. When I finally opened my eyes and looked over at his side of the bed, he was already sitting up and rubbing his face.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Just a bad dream," he said.

I rolled over and clicked on the lamp on my nightstand. I pushed my body into a sitting position and leaned back against the headboard. I looked down at my watch; almost 4 am.

"I'm sorry for waking you," he said sullenly. I ran my hand up and down his back and he leaned into my touch.

"What kind of dream?" I asked.

"Nothing you'd want to hear about," he said with a weary smile. His tired eyes scanned my face and then he kissed my cheek, stubble pricking my jaw line. Ethan rolled over and that was that.

It had been the third time over the last couple of weeks that a bad dream had violently shaken him out of his sleep. If they were that frightening then I wished that he'd tell me so he wouldn't be alone in this. But as it was all I could do was stand by idly and wait for him to come to me – forcing it out of him would get me further from where I wanted to be.

Saturday. Glorious, sunny Saturday. What was up my sleeve for Saturday? Nothing. Ethan handled the yard work, it was his own therapy. He loved it – it was like floral crack for him. I didn't work Saturdays, and it wasn't like I had paperwork to slave over anymore. No real hobbies. The neighbor husbands had a golf ritual. Every Saturday morning they'd go to the nearby course and just swing away the afternoon. I hated golf, but I was invited once, and it made me realize just what kind of douchebags I lived next door to. They were just full of racist jokes and sexist humor with personalities that were one-dimensional and bland. That was also the last time I went golfing with them.

I flipped through the channels and tried to find something worth watching, even a college game would suffice. All I found was QVC. I turned off the TV and moaned grumpily. I sidled into the kitchen and peered out the sliding glass doors to the backyard.

Ethan had already mowed and was now just trimming the hedges. He'd already taken off his shirt under the hot summer sun, and I swallowed. Five long weeks, that's how long it had been since Ethan and I'd well… partook in the 'perpetual premaritals.' He had this thing about not taking any risks while Shaun was home or still awake, and now that summer break had begun he stayed up playing his shooter games until it was damn near dawn. I still wasn't convinced that the kid slept at all because on the weekends he was up bright and early for the cartoons.

So with me working during the day when Shaun would be gone, and him home on the weekends, that left Ethan and I no real chance for some alone time. There was always a party, or a BBQ, or family time with the three of us, or the rare occasion when Grace would join us.

Ethan looked up and waved. I smiled halfheartedly and waved back, receding back into the shadows of the house. I had to get out of this house before pent up testosterone and aggravation drove me insane. My destination; the nearest bar.

I found a nice dive about fifteen minutes away. Ethan wouldn't be happy with my extracurricular choice of that day, but he could blow me – no, really, it would be a relief if he did. I settled into a table in a dark corner and hid behind the bottles of brew the young little blonde waitress would drop off. A sandy blonde woman at the bar had been eyeing me for the last twenty minutes and I would stare back on occasion. It was hard to peg her age without feeling like I was insulting her. On one hand, she looked older, maybe mid-fifties, but she still looked beautiful enough to pass for years in her forties. But then again, if she was in her forties I'd feel bad for mentally calling her old.

It wasn't until my third beer that she sauntered over and stood beside my table, looking down with a smile on her lips and a decision in her eyes.

"They're playing Patsy," she said.

"Walking After Midnight," I said. I looked down at my watch, and laughed. "They're playing it about seven hours too early."

She laughed with me and I took another swing, staring back up at her and wondering what her agenda was.

"Dance with me," she said.

"I don't dance, especially not in public," I said. Ethan was the only person who could get me to dance wherever he wanted me to, and that was never an obligation.

"Come on, do I have to drag you out onto the floor?" She held out her hand and winked. "Come on."

I resigned with a swig and a sigh. I took her hand and she helped me out of my booth and onto my feet. I was buzzed, feeling the alcohol in my legs already, but not enough to forget that there were eyes on me as she dragged me out in the middle of the floor. I took her hand as she wrapped the other around my shoulder.

"You want to get out of here?" She asked. "Let's go to your place."

I tried to stifle back my laughter, but a little made it through the barriers. Of all the guys to hit on in this place she picked me; I couldn't believe her taste in men was _that_ bad, but here we were.

"Go back to my place? You want to go back to my place?" I asked. She nodded with that ever-present smirk on her lips. "We can't."

"Well then how about my place?" She asked. I shook my head tipsily and smiled to match hers. "You know, it's true – what they say about older women; we do try harder, and I've got a lot of years' worth of perfected techniques I think you'll find quite pleasurable."

"No, I can't do that either," I said.

"Married?" She asked. My immediate reaction was to say no. I mean, technically Ethan and I weren't married, nor could we. Not unless the laws changed. Still, under the circumstances a yes wasn't farfetched.

"Yeah, I am." She nodded and continued to sway with me.

"Happily?" She asked.

"For the most part," I said.

"Then why are you here?" She asked. "Look, it's not like I think you're something special. Sometimes you just don't want to be alone for one night. Sometimes you just need to feel close to another person, you know?"

I could understand that, and I did understand the need to feel wanted by someone. I couldn't remember the last time that I'd felt _wanted_ or _needed_ by Ethan, yet I so longed for him in so many ways for so many days.

I kissed the back of her hand and left her on the floor, making my way back to my beer.

I pulled into the driveway. I knew that Ethan would smell the beer on my breath and immediately chastise me for driving while tipsy, but I'd made it home in one piece. I opened the door quietly and took a look around the house. It was well lit, and the TV filled the house with music. Yep, he was home and probably waiting on me. Great.

I sat my keys in the bowl beside the door and warily made my way into the kitchen where Ethan was tossing a salad. Something in the oven filled the kitchen with a delectable aroma, and I just about fell to my knees. I hadn't realized just how hungry I was.

"Hey," Ethan said with a smile. "I'm glad you're home, you can help me with dinner."

I reached across the counter and picked a mushroom out of the salad bowl.

"Don't pick with dirty hands," Ethan groaned, smacking my hand away as I laughed. He went to cutting up a cucumber and I walked behind him, sliding my hands around his waist and up his torso to his stomach and chest. I pressed my body against his back and placed a soft kiss on the back of his neck.

"Someone's feeling good," Ethan mumbled.

"I'm just glad to see you," I whispered into his ear, making sure to blow just a bit of warm breath into his ear. That usually sent chills down his back; the way his muscles had tensed up, I was guessing that hadn't changed since the last time.

"Not now, Norman," he said. But I ignored his words and took the lobe of his ear gently between my teeth and gave it a quick lash with my tongue. He jerked away. "Norman, I'm serious! Not now!"

"I'm sorry, I thought you might be just as happy to see me with such a busy week," I said, a little more bitter than I should have been.

"You're drunk," he said flatly.

"No, I'm buzzed at best," I said.

"You've been drinking." I could hear the disappointment in his tone and it had set something off in me. Some green little monster that had been stowing away somewhere inside of me decided to rear its ugly head.

"It that a problem?" I asked, raising my voice a little more. "I wanted to get away for a while, am I not allowed to?"

"Please, don't do this," Ethan begged in a low voice. He stuck the knife upright in the wooden cutting board and turned to look me in the eye, folding his arms loosely. "Don't do this, not tonight."

"Why not? Now's as good a time as any to have a good old fashioned marriage squabble." I placed my hands on the counter on either side of Ethan and leaned in closely.

"We have company Norman. Shaun brought one of his school friends and her father over for dinner to meet us and I want to make sure that they see how we are as a natural _happy_ family." Ethan turned his back to me and went back to chopping the cucumber.

"I was under the impression that my current disposition was my _natural_ state," I said acidly. "But then again, I don't have anything to prove to anyone else about us."

"I'm not trying to prove anything," he said quietly.

"Oh sure you are – that we're just like everyone else, that we breathe, and eat, and have just as much a right to raise a kid as any of these half-assed macho hetero fathers around here," I said. "Well if you want to prove to them that we bleed red like them then why not show them that we argue just like _real_ couples."

"Norman, for the last time I'm asking you not to do this tonight," he said, just as calm and comely as ever. And that was usually what made me even more irritated; no matter how hard I tried to pick a fight, Saint Ethan would never raise his voice or even get angry.

"I'll be upstairs," I said.

"You're not going to help me?" He asked.

"Apparently my hands are really dirty, remember? Besides, I want to get changed and look my best if we're going to give them the dog and pony show."

Ethan rolled his eyes and went back to his studious task of cutting and mixing.

I immediately felt like shit after everything had been said and done. I sat at the top of the stairs and listened to Ethan working alone downstairs in the kitchen. Alone. He didn't deserve any of that attack that had just taken place. Wasn't that the point of having a partner? To help when the going got rough? Wasn't I supposed to make him feel safe no matter what? Wasn't it my first and foremost job to make him feel secure in my love and trust? I turned tail and practically bit his head off the first time he asks for my help. I'd sum it up to stress, but that wasn't really being honest.

I changed into casual slacks, a buttoned shirt and v-neck sweater, steadying my drooping eyes as I tried not to look so 'intoxicated.' I brushed my teeth and gargled like it was water from the fountain of youth to try and kill the beer breath, but the acidic taste still lingered.

I sheepishly made my way downstairs but avoided the kitchen, instead darting straight into the living room and changing the music to something more soothing. I stretched out on the couch and wondered how I was going to look Ethan in his eyes for the rest of the evening after making such an ass out of myself. I was just thankful that the company of the night hadn't arrived yet.

When the doorbell finally rang, I heard Shaun dart out of his room and down the stairs. I hadn't heard him get this excited over anything in a long time. I could only assume that this girl was more than just a friend, or would be much more in the near future. We were probably going to have a lot more estrogen walking the floors of our house this summer than ever before. A vital young lady's touch never made things worse, at least not in my experience. She'd probably be a good influence on Shaun.

I heard him greet the visitors in the hall and I rolled off of the couch and steadied myself. I was getting soberer for the most part, I could pull this evening off with enough charm and grace to satisfy Ethan's plans. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he had been trying really hard to prove his point, had been ever since the day I moved in. But for some reason I just couldn't put half as much heart into it as he did. I envied that about him, on top of the dozen other things I so envied about him.

I walked into the dining room and put on my best smile.

"Hello, welcome," I said. I extended my hand toward the father; tall, six-foot two or so. Strawberry-blond, green eyes, and a nice smile. Solid grip, firm handshake, I was guessing he'd played football in his college days. "I'm Norman."

"Gregory," he said. He looked down at the girl standing beside him, with long blonde curls and eyes as green as her father's. "This is Anna, or H as her friends call her."

"H?" I asked. "How do you get H out of Anna?"

The way her eyes looked at me, it was like she was scared of me or something. Was my smile really that bad? Whatever she saw as she stared at me, it took her a moment to shake the shock out of her system before she accepted my hand and shook it.

Ethan set the table, and the rest of the evening consisted of him rambling as Shaun and Anna exchanged the occasional blushing glance. Once in a while I would catch Ethan's eyes, and no matter how much I tried to look pleasant and pleasing to him, there lingered that air of disappointment that disheartened any spirit I could muster.

"Please excuse me, I just need some fresh air," I said. Gregory nodded graciously, and I didn't even look Ethan's way since I knew just what kind of glare I'd see in that direction.

Stepping onto the back patio and scuffed my shoes against the smooth lacquered wood. I realized that despite my best efforts, I couldn't escape my guilt over Ethan out here any more than I could in his presence. Ethan was everywhere outside. He'd kept this yard in top shape. He'd decorated the inside with hints of himself, pictures of me and him, and the three of us as a family. Ethan made this home, and he treated me better than he needed to. Better than I deserved.

I heard the glass doors slide shut behind me and I glanced over my shoulder. Gregory joined me on the patio.

"Good night; clear and full of moon," he said. "I love summers here. Now and then you'll get the surprise rainstorm, but nights like this make up for them."

"Yeah, they sure do," I said mechanically. He shoved something long and brown under my face.

"Cigar?" He asked. I took it and sniffed it. My old boss used to be fond of offering his personal stock around, and I'd been obliged to partake a time or two. I tucked it between my teeth and Gregory lit the other end for me.

"Thanks," I said. I knew Ethan wasn't fond of the smell of smoke, but since I was already in the dog house and probably looking at a night of couch-camping it couldn't possibly hurt.

"So how long have you and Ethan lived in this house?" Gregory asked.

"One year and… three months." I took a puff and glanced over at Gregory as he rocked back and forth on his heels. "Are you and Anna new here?"

"Oh, no – I was born two miles from this spot," he said. "We've lived in this neighborhood for about three years now."

"Really? I haven't seen you around," I said.

"I've seen _you_," he said. I saw him staring at me out of the corner of my eye; it made me a bit uncomfortable, to be honest. But I've never liked the feeling of being the center of anyone's attention, Ethan being the blaring exception to that. "How long have you and Ethan been together?"

"Two years," I said.

"Everything going great between the two of you?" He asked. "You two didn't exactly look like honeymooners when you were looking at each other tonight."

"Just stress at the moment, that's all," I said. "You married, Gregory?"

It wasn't exactly a smooth topic transition, but I didn't feel like gossiping about mine and Ethan's problems with a guy I'd only just met.

"I was, my wife died a few years ago," he said. "We'd been separated about two years prior to that, anyway. I wanted to discuss our options, and she thought I was a pig."

"Options?" I asked with a wry glance at him. I noticed that he was still staring.

"I wanted to explore an open relationship, or maybe something loosely polyamorous – she didn't," he said. "Have you and Ethan discussed anything like that?"

"No," I said. Particularly because I couldn't imagine Ethan going out to find love from some stranger. I'd go mad with jealousy, I'd be deflated with inadequacy, wondering what I didn't have that he was looking for. I wouldn't want anyone but Ethan, and the thought of him wanted someone else over me… I would rather experience an ARI attack and bleed to death.

"You know, if you're having problems in a young relationship it's not a bad idea to discuss," he said.

Gregory moved closer to me, practically pressed against my side. He snaked an arm around my shoulder and I was too shell-shocked to react; was this guy really hitting on me? Right here, right now? In my own home with Ethan just inside? With his own daughter able to see?

"Listen, in case you'd like to just sit down and have a little friendly chat, maybe come over for a drink and just hang out like old pals, don't hesitate to give me a call," he said. He slipped his business card into my pocket and then he was gone.

What the fuck was that about?

I put out the cigar and headed back inside. Shaun and Anna were laughing, clearing the table as Ethan and Gregory chatted. I stuck to the sidelines and tried to stay out of sight and out of mind. I was glad to send Gregory on his way and bid Anna a good night. I staggered tiredly upstairs and slip the sweatshirt off of my body and kicked off my shoes, falling back on the bed.

Ethan came into the room and didn't say a word. He unbuttoned his shirt and slipped it off of his shoulders.

"Thank you," he said monotonously.

"For what?" I asked.

"For doing me the favor of playing nice," he said. His attitude was tedious. Distant.

"Ethan, will you just look at me?"

His numb eyes met my gaze, and I felt like a child caught shoplifting.

"I'm sorry." I couldn't help the tremble in my voice or the warmth that suddenly flooded my eyes. I paused and looked away to make sure that I didn't break down. I hated that being around Ethan turned me into a mushy, emotional being. "You needed me, and I wasn't there."

"No, you weren't," he said.

"I know that we're having some problems now but I just need you to help me," I said. Ethan's eyes weren't so numb anymore, now somewhat lost and curious. "Help me figure out what it is that I can do to make things the way they used to be. I want to be the _us_ that I remember."

Ethan sat on the bed and ran a hand down my chest, along my stomach.

"I'm sorry, too," he said. "I shouldn't have brushed you off like that. And I shouldn't have gotten so upset when you came home from drinking. Home is supposed to be a sanctuary, and sometimes I just get so caught up in what I've got to do for everyone else that I forget what's really important."

He placed an arm on the other side and leaned over me, looking down into my face.

"I know that I've been neglecting you lately, and I haven't been meeting your emotional needs," he said morosely. "You've been shouldering this all on your own. Can you forgive me?"

"You're too good to me," I said. He leaned down and kissed me softly. I ran my fingers through his hair and pulled the back of his head toward me. And for the first time in a while, there was more than a distant semblance of passion between us; Ethan and I were reminded of just how strong our love was with the charged kisses between us.

His hands went to unbuckling my belt and I pulled my shirt over my head. It felt better than I remembered to have his warm chest pressed down against mine as he straddled my hips. I'd nearly forgotten just how we felt when we were together in passion, forgotten the zeal of being one person with Ethan as we held and catered to one another. And we stayed that way until morning, waking slowly and just listening to the birds outside.

"I love you," I whispered into his ear. He reached back and scratched my head gently, massaging with his soft touch.


	2. Chapter 2: Head OVer Heels

AN: Regarding the 'famn damily' phrase in chapter one, it's not actually a typo – it's something my dad used to say. "Now we're going to sit here and eat like a famn-damily!" d(^_^)b

2. Head Over Heels

"Damn." I leaned closer into the mirror and parted the hair on the left side of my temple. A silver streak glinted in buzzing fluorescence; just a single grey hair. Every time I plucked that bastard he found a way to grow back in without me noticing. I gripped it between my thumb and index finger, giving one quick, firm tug. I winced as the sting of the prick flared, but felt better once I tossed it away.

"You're wasting time worrying about it," Ethan said as he watched me in the doorway. I tossed a sour look his way as I continued to comb my hair. He chuckled, and the intensity of heat in my eyes grew.

"Do I amuse you?" I asked.

"It's just so cute that you're just months away from turning 38 and you're already on the verge of a midlife crisis," he said with a boyish grin.

"Says the forty-two-year-old," I mumbled.

"I have grey hairs that sprout and you never see me fretting about them. Hell, my temples are well on their way to being completely silver," he said.

"That's different," I groaned. "On you, it's distinguished; on me, it's out of place."

He walked off laughing at my predicament and I boiled as I tried to place him out of mind. I stepped back and took a look at myself. Midlife crisis? I think not: I still looked damn good and could still bring Ethan to his knees if I wanted to. He was just kidding himself.

Still… maybe I should pick up a hair dye kit on my way home…

I walked downstairs and smelled Ethan's cooking. I had planned to just head right out the door, but… well, Ethan demanded a detour today. I made my way into the kitchen and saw Shaun eating at the dining room table.

"Morning, Shaun," I said. He nodded once in my direction, nonchalant and uninterested. Teenagers. "Anna seemed really nice." Couldn't say the same about her asshole of a dad, though.

"Don't bother, he's not talking to us today," Ethan said. He glanced up with a small smirk and then looked back down at his skillet. "Apparently we still managed to embarrass him in front of Anna last night."

"Just the same, I'd love to stay and chat but I've got to get breakfast to go today," I said.

"Every Sunday, like clockwork," Ethan said. He kept his sunny disposition shining, but he couldn't hide the displeasure in his words. He liked to have breakfast together as a couple the morning after we did dirty deeds. And I was usually more than happy to oblige since I liked the residual feeling of being closer to Ethan. But today would have to be one of the few times I buggered off before we got a chance. "Just remember that I need you tonight."

"I know – I'll be back beforehand, I promise," I said. I leaned in and what was meant to be a quick kiss turned into something longer, lingering. It had been a while since Ethan and I had been so intimate and cherishing of each other, and this kiss vanquished any remaining doubts in my mind. When I broke the kiss and pulled away, looking into his soft baby blue eyes, I was filled with warmth that the morning summer sun couldn't match. "Do you have to go today?"

"Yes," I said. I didn't want to – I'd rather spend today afternoon with my better half.

"Why do you go see him?" He asked.

"There are some things that you just have to do, no matter what the past harbors," I said. "It's just one of those things that you have to trust me on." Ethan wasn't exactly pleased with that vague, cryptic answer, but he didn't press anything further. "I love you."

"I love you, too – drive safely," he said.

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_Leonalia had been thinking a lot lately about how she wanted to die. She refused to become a helpless vegetable lying on a bed in a small, white room for the rest of her life. She didn't exactly want to commit suicide, but it looked like her choices were slim, and she didn't want to linger for too long._

_None of the greats ever lingered. They died young, they died beautiful, and they were remembered for it. James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Aaliyah, Brittany Murphy – all of them immortally etched into the hearts of millions because they died tragically young._

_Leonalia was going to be one of them. She just needed to figure out just when and how she was going to do it. She imagined it would come during a dire moment of life and death; go out like a hero. 'She sacrificed herself for us all', they would say. They would say great things about her, inspirational things, and remember her exactly how she was: young, and beautiful._

_The problem was deciding just when was too soon, and when she was lingering for too long. How could she aptly decide when she could safely give up what time she had left without worrying that she'll miss out on something important if she'd just waited a little longer?_

_She supposed that she wouldn't remember the experiences she'd passed up anyway. But which sunset was going to be the one that couldn't be topped? Which breath was sweet enough to be her last? Which thought was worthy of condemning her soul into the hands of the Nemuri?_

"Just stop reading, please!"

I snapped the book shut and placed it on the table as my guest paced the room – at least, paced as much area as he could while being shackled to the leg of a table that was bolted to the floor.

"Another fuckin' word of that crap and I'll hang myself," he said.

"Not a fan of angsty, overwrought, unrequited teenage love stories?" I asked mockingly. It was just something I'd grabbed out of Shaun's room, but a part of me choose it just because I knew that it would bug the hell out of Blake.

"Next time you can just bring me razor and I'll just cut my ears off," he growled.

"So what's new with you?" I asked.

"Well I just got a new cell with a view of the yard – complete with 300-count Egyptian sheets and a bidet," he said. "Same shit as last week – I'm in goddamn prison, you shitty asshole!"

"Something must have happened, your attitude is worse than last Sunday's diatribe," I said calmly as I sat at the table and watched him like a hamster in a pin. "It's not good for you to hold onto whatever's bothering you; otherwise the next five years of your seven year minimum sentence isn't going to be a resort stay."

"Fuck you," Blake said with a callous sneer. "Seven to life… You what kind of hell that is?"

"Just be a good boy and you might get out early on good behavior," I said. "Who knows? I might even write you a recommendation letter. I mean, when the man you tried to kill speaks on your behalf it can't hurt your case."

Blake finally settled into his chair. His orange jumpsuit was giving me a headache, having stared at it for a while under the fluorescent lights in the room. "So do you want to talk about what's bothering you?"

"Why do you care? Since when are you such a kind, understanding individual?" He asked scathingly. I shrugged.

"I've learned a lot from my better half," I said. I may not that understood or practiced much of what makes people so damn chipper and nice for no apparent reason, since in my experience people only did for something in return. But watching Ethan had opened up a new world to me, one that I was still trying to grasp. His humanitarian outlook, his actions, his words, they made me want to try harder, to fight against my natural untrusting disposition.

Blake laughed. "Ah, yes, the missus."

"I refer to him as the Mister," I said. "So, let's hear it; what's got you biting heads off today?"

"You," he said. "You're driving me insane. You drive me crazy because I can't figure out what you're doing here."

"Just paying you a visit."

"Yeah, every Sunday for the last two years. 117 visits, to be exact," he said. "What I can't figure out is why."

"Blake, we're old friends," I said nonchalantly. He didn't buy it, of course.

"The fuck we are – you're up to something, Jayden. I don't know what it is, and I don't care, as long as you're not out to screw me," he said. I leaned forward on the table and dropped all pretenses, staring him in his crazed eyes.

"I'm not out to screw you, Blake. I don't want anything from you, and I do wish well for you," I said.

That just seemed to make him even more irate than he already was.

"See, I just don't get it. It doesn't make any sense. I tried to kill you, and if you were still lying in that box under the lake water I wouldn't feel an ounce of remorse over you today. So why would you wish me well in any way? What gain is there in you being nice to me and coming to see me? What the fuck do you want form me?"

"Nobody should be alone," I said. I looked down at the table and thought my words over carefully. I didn't want to tell him everything I knew about me and him, I wasn't sure I really ever wanted him to know about our bond at all. But a part of me, a very, very small part deep in the deepest, coldest pits of my innards had a warm spot for him. I didn't know where it'd come from, or who planted it there (it was probably Ethan and his talk on forgiveness and charity) but it was there, and I just couldn't ignore it. I felt a sense of pity for Blake; no family left with Rex dead, no friends, just a heart full of anger and an isolated sentence to let it stew in loneliness. It was my own worst fear, being alone forever. For some strange, inexplicable reason I just couldn't condemn Blake to that fate, not even if he still considered himself my enemy.

Blake really didn't know how to respond to that answer, and I didn't want to add anything else to it that might reveal too much. So I picked up the book and continued to read out loud.

By the time I left the visitation center the sun was already settling on the horizon. I checked my watch; 6:27 pm. Ethan wasn't going to be happy – I was supposed to be dressed and ready to go with him to his big office dinner almost thirty minutes ago. But having my phone and other valuables confiscated while inside the facility, I couldn't get any phone calls. I checked my voicemail, and sure enough there were three messages, tiered from frustrated Ethan, to disappointed Ethan, to a mélange of disappointed/worried Ethan.

I drove straight home and found my slacks and a dress shirt ironed and laid out for me on the bed. I slipped them on, wrapped a tie around my neck and grabbed my blazer as I flew out the door. I knew where Ethan's architectural firm was, I'd been to these dinners before. Mingling and smiling on Ethan's behalf because, for some unfathomable reason, he actually cared what these people thought about him and us, just like our neighbors.

I parked and ran into the lobby. The guard, Joe, tipped his hat in my direction and watched me jog by, heading straight to the elevators. Third floor. I tried calling Ethan to let him know that I was here, but he wasn't answering.

When the doors opened, I was immediately greeted by a crowd adorned with lavish champagne streamers and soft golden lighting. Some idiot immediately bumped into me as I tried to scan the crowd for Ethan's face; it was obviously distinguishable from the rest, particularly because once my eyes landed on him I couldn't breathe for a few seconds.

"Hey, you're Nolan, right?" The guy asked.

"Norman," I said shortly, trying to push him off of me. Unfortunately he was so soused that he was using me as a support to keep himself upright.

"Yeah, yeah, you're Ethan's… brother?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever – you seen him around?" I asked.

"Oh, yeah, sure, he's at the boss' table, in the far back," he said. I unwrapped his arm from around my shoulders and let him cling to the blonde woman to his right. I ducked out of sight before either could stop me.

Once I surface behind the safety of a cubicle wall, I saw Ethan sitting casually and collected with his boss, Mr. Scholermann, and his wife Samantha. We'd had them over for dinner on numerous occasions, so I was fairly familiar with them, if no one else in Ethan's office.

"Ethan!" I caught his attention as I approached the table. He looked up and I saw the guarded mask; features smooth and emotionless, like a mannequin. Mr. Scholermann and his wife both nodded with smiles.

"Norman," Mr. Scholermann acknowledged. "Come, join us."

"I will, but do you mind if I steal Ethan away for a moment?" I asked. Ethan sat his champagne glass down on the table and excused himself. He followed me out onto the balcony and closed the glass doors behind us.

"Ethan, I am so sorry that I'm late – I just lost track of time, and I tried calling but you didn't answer," I said.

"My phone was off," he said. He smiled, a bit coldly and fortified. "I was in the middle of a speech and had to save myself too much further embarrassment so I just took the battery out and shoved it in my pocket."

"A speech?" I asked. "Did I miss something important?"

"I made partner," Ethan said.

"Of the entire firm? That's amazing," I said. "I'm so proud of you – I'm sorry that I missed the announcement!"

"Don't worry about it," he said. He leaned on the railing and peered down at the lights of cars and street lamps. He was so exquisitely beautiful, striking in ways that I'd never seen before. Even after two years he never ceased to amaze me because it wasn't just his looks, his personality shined through with them. It was a balanced package that blended into something gorgeous and touching. But there was some sorrow that lingered in his eyes.

"Really, Ethan, I'm sorry that I wasn't home when I said I would be," I said. "I just got caught up."

"I'm sure you did," he said tactfully. The threw me back for a moment.

"Are you angry with me about something?" I asked.

"Should I be?" He countered. "Where were you today?"

"I was at the prison, just like every other Sunday," I said.

"Did you happen to make any detours on the way home that kept you?"

"Where the hell am I going to stop?" I asked incredulously. Why the hell was I on trial here?

"I don't know, maybe Gregory's."

I stared, confused and completely thrown for a loop. "Wait, wait, wait – what the hell does Gregory have to do with _any_ of this?"

"I found the card and the note," Ethan said. "It was still in your pocket when I went to wash your clothes for you."

He reached into his pocket and slipped the business card and a folded piece of paper, holding them out toward me. I took them wearily form his fingers and glanced down at the business card. His cell number was circled in pen and he'd written _call me ;)_ below. I unfolded the notepad strip and read it out loud.

"Norman, I'm so glad you'd called, I had a really great time today… Fun playing hookie on our lunch break… Amazing things you did to me with that tongue of yours – Ethan, this isn't, I don't know what the hell this is," I said.

"I think it's pretty clear what it is," he said. And there it was; the cold, black pain smeared across his face from the betrayal he thought I'd put on his shoulders. He was hurting so badly inside right now, worse that he was letting on to anyone, and I was the cause of that pain – or, at least he thought I was.

"I'm not messing around with Gregory and I'm not cheating behind your back," I told him. "Last night was the first and last time I've seen Gregory. He slipped his card in my pocket last night after he came onto me, but I sent him on his way."

"Then you tell me why he would just write a note like that," he said shakily. "Why would he just write a note and put it in your pocket if it didn't happen? What would he gain from that?"

"I don't know, but don't you think it's a good idea for us to go ask him about it?"

"Go ask him yourself, I can't deal with this right now," Ethan said.

"Fine, we'll go ask him tomorrow when I get off of work. Let's just go back inside for now, and we'll –"

"No," Ethan said. I'd taken a step toward him, but he pushed me away. "I can't stand the sight of you right now, let alone be in your presence."

"Are you serious?"

"Just leave, please." He turned his back without another word and left me, dumbstruck and aching on the balcony.

Didn't I have any say? Didn't my word have any weight in this? I could understand where he was coming from, and the sense of pure treachery at the thought of my unfaithful infidelity eating his heart from the inside out, but that didn't make his cold words sting any less. It took every fiber of willpower not to break down and cry right there. I didn't want to be a spectacle for all of his coworkers to ogle. I just left quietly and went down to the car where I sat, wounded and bewildered.

Why the fuck would Gregory do this to me? Why the hell would he put a note like that in my pocket but to set me up? I was going to find out just why, right now. I turned on the engine and revved right through the city like a fireball in the atmosphere. I sped right to Gregory's house, I didn't care if I sped by a cop or not.

I pounded on the door like a drunken redneck who found out his wife was cheating on his with his own brother. I even kicked it a few times until the door finally opened. Gregory leaned out the door, irritated and baffled.

"what the hell are you doing, man?"

"What the fuck is this?" I pulled out the note and card and threw them on the ground. He took in what they were, and his mystification cleared right up like a vapor wafted away. "Do you know that Ethan thought that we fucked around? He'd upset – no, he's fucking _hurt_ because of you."

"Look, just come inside and I'll explain everything." Gregory stepped aside, but I stood my ground and stared him down.

"You're going to explain everything to me right now," I said through gritted teeth.

"Look, it was just a note I'd written out of a daydream, and I thought that if you were interested in getting together then you'd at least find some humor in it," he said. The worst part was that I found an earnest honesty in his words. "Look, I did something really stupid when I was drunk, and when I hit on you last night I thought I'd go all out."

"Well get this through your head – I love Ethan, he is the only person I want in my love and sex lives, and I'm not going to betray his trust," I said.

"Look man, I'm sorry – I shouldn't have even tried to come between another couple and caused this pain, especially the parents of Anna's best friend," he said. "I already feel really shitty about it, can't you just let this go and go back to being the neighbors that see each other once a year?"

I took a deep breath and eyed him from the ground up, thinking over his plea. I'd planned to come over here and bash his face in seven ways until Sunday, but now that I was a bit calmer and seeing less red, I resigned and stuck out my hand. He shook it, relieved, and then I shoved my fists into my pockets to resist the urge to do him harm.

"You're going to explain this whole thing to Ethan once he gets home," I warned him. He nodded quickly and put his hands up.

"Of course," he said. "You want to have a beer while we wait?"

"No fucking way," I said firmly.

"Come on, I've got Scotch in my cabinet. The least I can do after being such a dick is give you a good drink," he said. I mulled that over; his logic did make perfect sense, but I really didn't want to be anywhere near him at the moment and I definitely didn't want to set foot in the house that Ethan already thought I was using as a means to cheat on him. But the fact remained that I needed a good stiff drink right now to clear my head, and numb the ache in my chest at the thought of Ethan's wounded face tonight.

I stepped inside and he shut the door behind me.

"You should've gone home," Gregory said. I turned around and saw his hands reach out as he gripped my head. He smashed my head against the hard wall, and my world went black.

I didn't know how long I was unconscious, I didn't even dream. I just came to with the throbbing sting of a headache, not to mention the ache of my head where It'd been hit with an entire _wall._

I went to open and stretch my sore jaw, but found my mouth bound. Duct tape was wrapped around my entire head. My wrists were duct taped to a wooden chair, and my ankles bound together. My feet were sitting in a bucket of milky looking water. Everywhere I looked there was concrete; I was in a basement.

The basement door opened, and in walked Gregory. He whistled as he lugged a car battery under his arm.

"Oh, look who's up," he said. I immediately started to cuss him out, but unfortunately my words were lost in the tape. "Something you want to get off of your chest?"

He sat the battery on his work table, next to a circular saw, and picked up a pair of scissors. He dug one tip under the tape, digging into my skin until he cut and ripped it off of my skin.

"You mother fucker!" the insult was partly out of the preexisting anger in me, and partly because that hurt like a bitch. "Get me out of this chair right now!"

"Nah, I'm not going to do that. If I do, you'll just attack me and make a run for it, probably even escape." He dragged a chair into the middle of the room and placed it before me. He sat in the chair and faced me with a blank slate of a stare. The shadow of his brow from the light above our heads cast his eyes in shadow and I couldn't see them well. "No, you and me are going to have a little talk."

"Let me go now and I promise I won't go to the police," I said.

"Yes you will," he said. "You can't talk your way out of this, Norman. I'm ordering a steak."

"What the fuck does that mean?" I asked. Gregory leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and put his hands together, lacing his fingers.

"I used to be a chef. And there were always these businessmen who'd come in with their heart set on a steak. 'I've been craving a big, juicy steak,' they'd say. And then along comes the waiter, who tells them the specials. And then suddenly that steak starts sounding a little less appealing. 'Boy, that lobster sounds a little better, doesn't it? Maybe I don't want such a big heavy steak today,' and then the waiter ends up changing their minds. But you can't change my mind, I know what I want and I'm going to get it."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that you can talk and talk, and try to plea and bargain with me, but my mind is set," he said. He leaned in closer and looked me in the eye; I could finally see through the shadows. "I'm going to kill you, Norman."

His words were dead set, and his eyes were even colder. I knew that he meant every word he said, and that in itself unnerved me. Whatever plan of negotiation I had was immediately drained from me when the option was no longer available; it never had been.

"Killing me is going to be a little different than ordering a steak," I said.

"Not for me, it won't be," he said flatly. He kept his death stare fixed and I could feel the malevolence radiating out of him.

"How are you going to do it? Strangle me? Slit my throat and bleed me out?" I asked.

"No, I've got something creative in store for you," he said.

"You can really do that? You can really kill another human being?" I asked skeptically. What credulity I was demanding, he definitely delivered when he kept his cool, set face and spoke only the truth to me.

"No, I couldn't do that to another human being but I can do it you," he said. "You took something from me, something precious, a long time ago. You're going to die slowly, agonizingly slowly. But that's not until later. First we're going to have some fun, and then I'm going to ask you a few questions."

He grabbed the car battery off of the table and sat it on the floor next to the bucket where my feet were submerged. He clamped jumper cables to the positive and negative ends, and held the other two ends firmly in his grip.

You ever stuck your hand in salt water with an electric current running through it?" He asked. I shook my head and fought back the fear building up in my eyes. Maybe I wouldn't be so scared if there was anything I could say to change his mind, but I knew that he was reconciled with his decision, and he knew that I knew it as well. "Well then this should be fun as well as educational."


	3. Chapter 3: Open Your Eyes

3. Open Your Eyes

It wasn't the electric current that hurt, it wasn't painful at all. The painful part of Gregory's 'shock therapy' was that once both ends of the jumper cables touched the solution, every muscle below my knee cramped up, tensed and rigid. After two hours of this, ever nerve in my legs were sore and crying. The only relief was when he pulled out for a few seconds. The worst part was that there was no longer a point; he stopped asking questions half an hour ago. This was just for sport.

Gregory sat back in his chair and slipped his phone out of his back pocket.

"Listen, as much fun as this is, I have to run for a bit. Make yourself at home," he said. He lifted my sore, tender legs out of the bucket and slid it away. Every simple movement hurt enough to scream, but I bit down on my bottom lip to save my breath. "Don't go anywhere."

Oh, ha ha. He ran up the stairs and I heard the basement door lock behind him. Once I heard the front door lock I tried my hand at getting myself free. I pulled and yanked at the duct tape around my wrists; snapping a bone wasn't going to get me out of this mess. Even so, knowing how badly that hurt and how long recovery took, I didn't think I had the courage to do that again. No, unless I could cut the tape from around my wrists, there was no getting out of this.

But I could break the chair. The problem was figuring out how. As I pulled and tugged, the chair didn't give way, not even a creek. It was a sturdy chair, maybe even brand new. So there I sat, with legs so sore and tender that they'd been rendered immovable, and waterlogged feet that stung like hell.

Birds chirpped outside, but I saw no light from the windows along the top of the basement foundation. Maybe it was still dark? A cool early morning, when all save the earliest of us risers rolled out of bed. Ethan would still be in bed, sleeping soundly without a care in the world. Well, that was if he didn't have the idea of my infidelity fresh in his mind.

Did he wonder where I was right now? Did he care? Maybe he thought that I'd just given up on him, decided to move on. I prayed that wasn't the case.

I supposed that the most frustrating part about all of this was that Ethan had absolutely no problem in the concept of me seeing someone else behind his back. The evidence presented made the scenario so believable that an Oscar could be awarded for its execution, but to believe that I would do something like that so quickly, without further provocation, cleaved my mind like an axe. I just couldn't fathom what I'd ever done for Ethan to doubt me so easily.

Had I not given him enough in the past to prove fealty to him? Had I not given him tangible hope in our future?

I sat there pondering my failures until I heard the door upstairs open and sets of feet entered the house. And as I thought about what Gregory had in store for me a helpless, dismal darkness overtook me like a shadow looming over my head. I'd survived a lot in my years; gun standoffs, fatal wounds, being buried alive. Something about this time felt different. It was like in the back of my head I knew that this was it. I'd cashed in all of my chips, used up my nine lives, had a good run and now it was my time. Maybe it was the bleak parting Ethan had left me last night. Maybe it was knowing that this time I was completely at Gregory's mercy without the hope of fighting back; he'd bound me and rendered my legs useless.

Maybe I just didn't want to fight if Ethan didn't believe in us.

The basement door opened and in sauntered Gregory with a tune whistling on his lips.

"Sturdy chair," I said. Figured if he was going to kill me it didn't hurt to make small talk. "Couldn't shake spoke or limb loose."

"Oh, you like it, do you?" He asked with a smirk. "Yeah, I made that. Took about three days."

"I didn't know you were a carpenter," I said.

"I've always been one to work with my hands – you'd have known that if you'd read my business card," he said. "If you like the chair, you're going to love what I've made for you."

"For me? You shouldn't have."

"You know, I like you; even when you know you're going to die you still have a sense of humor."

"I kind of got the hint when you came onto me," I said. He chuckled and leaned against his work bench.

"Nah, that was just to lure you – I'm not interested in men," he said.

"Aww, no courtesy sword-fights before you do me in?"

"I'm afraid not," he said. He sat in the chair across from me and locked eyes once again. "So here we are."

"Yeah, here we are," I sighed. "So what happens now?"

"You're going to tell me why you don't deserve to die," he said. That threw me off.

"I thought you said that I couldn't change your mind."

He smiled. "You can't."

"Then what would be the point?"

"You find out a lot about a man when he's facing death. I need you to open up – I need you to start letting everything out. Only then can you answer my questions."

"Then you're out of luck, Gregory; I have no reasons to offer," I said. As depressing as that sounded, I really had no valid argument to state just why I didn't deserve to die. I had plenty of reasons to argue the opposite, though, which made me feel worse. "What's going to happen to Ethan and Shaun?"

"Oh, that depends on what you say when I ask you my questions," he said.

"Leave them out of this," I said. It wasn't a command, it wasn't a threat, it was a plea. I knew he'd see it that way as well – why wouldn't he? He had me in every way. "Whatever you think I did to you doesn't involve them."

"What did you do to me?" He asked. He leaned forward and the humor was gone; all that remained was the silent, calculating predator I'd been dealing with for the last few hours. "You don't even know what it is you did, do you? You don't even know what it is you took from me, do you?"

All I could do was shake my head in defeat.

"Then how can you tell me that it doesn't involve them?" He spat at the ground at my feet and stood up, knocking his chair over and kicking it into the wall. Some bound rage, an inner beastly fury, had been unleashed from its darkly warped manacles. Or maybe it hadn't been caged at all, simply sitting in the corner and waiting for the right moment to surface; gauging my reactions so that it knew just how to deal with me.

Gregory ran his trembling hands through his hair and took a few deep breaths, I assumed to clear his head.

"The worst part is that you ruin lives for a living and it's written off like a piece of bad meat in the kitchen," Gregory growled. His breathing calmed a bit, and he dropped his hands to his sides. "If you want me to be completely honest with you, I don't know what I'm going to do with Ethan and Shaun either. What you should remember is that everything you say is going to tell me what they deserve."

"May I ask what qualifies you to make such a complex decision?"

"Master's in Human Behavior, Yale; PhD in Psychology with a minor in Mental Assessment, Brown," Gregory said. "Or maybe we can just agree that I'm qualified to make such a decision simply because I'm the one who's not all tied up."

Gregory clicked out the light and made his way up the stairs. "If you do care for them, and from what I saw a couple of nights ago I'm convinced that you do, then you should keep your questions on my performance to a minimum."

He slammed the door behind him and left me in the dark.

"Something that always bugged me about you," I heard, like a whisper but it rang clearly in the shadows. "When it comes to others you'll do whatever it takes to keep someone safe, but you're always just ready to give up at your own expense."

I couldn't see Him in the dark, not that I needed to.

"I thought you were gone," I said sullenly.

"I'm never gone," He said. "I've just been on vacation."

"For two years? Where'd you go?"

"Bermuda," He said. "Great weather this time of year. And then I come back and see you in yet another mess."

"You're wasting your time here; there's no Tripto anywhere near here," I said.

"I'm not always driven by base desires, I just like to see you fall," He said.

"Well then you should be enjoying yourself right now, seeing me in this situation."

"See, that's where you're wrong; I said I like to see you fall. You know, weaker than me, beaten into submission. This is life or death, I never find joy seeing you in these situations."

"Oh, so now you have a moral tier? That's where you draw the line?" I asked skeptically.

"Of course; if you die, I die. I don't find joy in the prospect of that scenario at all," He said. Apparently neurotic delusions also share a sense of self preservation. I laughed at the satire of it all, and I had a feeling that He didn't like that.

"So what do you want from me? Did you want to enjoy some freedom before he does me in? Did you want to watch?"

"I'm here to help you get out of this mess, what do you think I want?" He asked maliciously.

"What can you possibly do for me?" I asked. I heard no answer. There was no answer to hear. Maybe my pessimism 'offended His sensibilities' and He left out of frustration. Whatever the reason, He'd left me here to rot alone in this dungeon.

The basement door opened and a crack of light splashed down the stairway. I heard boots clop down each step, one by one, and wondered what Gregory had to say to me. He might even be ready to _finally_ ask me these infamous questions that would decide the fates of me, Ethan, and Shaun.

When the light flicked on, I was greeted with long blonde locks of hair and two large, blue eyes. Anna stood before me with a bowl of oatmeal in her hands.

"My dad told me to come feed you, Mr. Jayden," she said. She picked up the chair against the wall and positioned it before me, taking a seat and scooping up the oatmeal with the spoon in her hand. "You really made him mad, whatever you said."

"Anna, I know that you love your father and you want to do right by him, but you have to realize that this isn't right. You have to get help," I said. A daughter never wants to question her father, but this was a dire situation.

"I thought you'd ask me to let you go," she said.

"No, if you let me go it will draw your dad's attention and put us both at risk," I said. She held the spoon up to my face and waited patiently. The stare she gave me was dull and indifferent. "You do want to help, right?"

"Now why would I want to do that?" She asked. I opened my mouth slowly as I analyzed the situation and chewed slowly after the fed me the spoon. I swallowed; her expression still hadn't changed.

"What do you want?" I asked, as casually as could be at the moment.

"To watch you suffer," she said. The headache in my mind pounded like a drum as I calculated her indifference. She was cold with me, and yet there was some kind of heat radiating from her façade reminiscent of her father.

"So you're in on this?" I asked. She sat the bowl down on the ground and leaned in close, practically pressing her lips against my ear.

"The note and business card were my idea," she whispered. When she sat back in her chair I saw a smooth, boastful smirk pulling the corners of her lips up with a sadistic twist. "Why do you think I became friends with Shaun in the first place?"

"So you sought me out," I said. Though the answer to that had been right in front of me with Gregory's vague diatribe, it hadn't really sunk in until Anna made it clear to me.

"From the very beginning," she said.

What hope there had been in using a bright, innocent young girl to help me out of this ditch wafted before my eyes like a heady vapor as a cruel visage stared back into my eyes.

"Why?" I asked.

"You have all the pieces to the puzzle, we've told you all the clues you need; you figure it out," she said. She slapped a hand against my thigh, patting my pocket with a wink. She kicked the bowl over at my feet and trudged upstairs without another word.

This situation ran deeper than I thought. I'd never known an Anna, or Gregory, or H in my life; what the hell did these people think I'd done to them? What could I possibly have taken from them?

Worse still, what did they have planned for Ethan and Shaun if I didn't live up to their 'expectations?'

If I could just get a call out to Ethan then I could at least warn him. They couldn't hurt him if he and Shaun were far away. The problem was getting that call out with no phone.

What clues had they given me? I barely knew them. I knew some basic names; Gregory, Anna/H, but pieces did I have to put together a reason to justify all of this?

I stretched my right hand toward my pocket, but my lap was so far away that not even the tips of my fingers couldn't graze the opening of the pocket. The only way I was getting my hand in that pocket was to raise my hip up high enough to reach inside. But there was an obstacle to that, and it happened to be the fact that my legs were in no condition to do any lifting. Lifting my body up to reach the pocket would feel like putting my legs in a meat grinder. But what choice did I have?

I bit my bottom lip and pushed, grunting through the pain of my sore legs. The immeasurable amount of pain surged through my nerves like flares in the night, and each calf felt like a hundred needles had been attached to a bear trap and clamped down into my flesh. I fell limply into the seat almost as soon as I'd tried to lift my body; it was too much.

"Come on, your fucking family depends on this," I said. I tried to pep myself up with a mantra. It didn't work well, but it was enough to get me prepped again. I gripped the arm of the wooden chair with my left hand and hoisted my pelvis into the air. I shoved my hand into my pocket as quickly as I could and found but two tools; my phone I could feel, and a card.

I let my body drop with a whimper and took a few deep breaths to get my mind off of the pain. My legs were throbbing, and stretching my toes out and moving them about seemed the only way to cope with the pain.

I glanced down at the business card; great, Gregory's card. Like that was going to do me any good. I tossed it to the side and immediately turned my attention to the phone. When I pressed the home button, there was a rather unusual screen to greet me; the emergency locked screen. The emergency lock was a safety precaution in which I could select up to five emergency numbers of my choosing to dial. The only way to unlock all of the features and contacts on my phone was to enter the five digit lock code into the upper right corner of the screen.

I tried my default code; it didn't work. So they'd set the code on my phone; another method of control. I knew the captive/victim control games, knew all of the techniques. It was all a part of submission in criminal profiling. Only two numbers were at my disposal; Ethan's cell, and a number I didn't know at all.

I tried the unknown number and put it on speakerphone. It rang a couple of times, and when the answering click resounded in my ear, I held my breath for a moment.

"Hello?" I waited for a reply.

"You called my number first," Gregory said. "Start guy; I would've bet my last dollar that you would've tried to call Ethan's phone first."

"And what would've happened if I did call his number first?" I asked.

"You would've failed the test, and sealed his fate."

So much for getting the word out to him. With Anna over at our house every day, she'd been watching and studying us. She was probably over there right now, hanging out with Shaun while Ethan supervised while pretending not to pay attention to them to give them some semblance of privacy, like a good father should. If I'd called Ethan, they would know.

"This lets me know that I can trust you, Norman," Gregory said. "We're off to a good start to the end."

"Why trust me with a way to call Ethan in the first place?" I asked.

"Oh, it'll come into play in time, _if_ your answers lead us down that path," he said. "I want you to suffer. More than that, I want your loved ones to suffer, but only if you give me reason to."

"Fuck you," I said. I hung up and resisted the urge to throw the phone onto the concrete ground. But I couldn't do that, I still needed it.

My eye wandered to Gregory's damn business card. And when I read the name on above his number, his _full_ name that I'd been overlooking, Anna's cryptic message made sense.

I had been given all of the tools and clues to realize the reason I was here in this chair. H. Anna. Gregory. It all fell together once I'd seen the surname.

My fight for survival began at that moment.


	4. Chapter 4: TV On The Radio

4. TV On The Radio

I held the phone in my hand, staring at the bright screen. The battery was still full, three glorious bars of useless energy. I stared at the two numbers in my arsenal; Gregory's, and Ethan's. I wanted to call Ethan, more than anything I wanted to call and just make sure that he and Shaun were safe. He could be angry with me all he wanted to, but as long as he and shun were all right then I didn't care.

But with Anna the watchdog keeping an eye on them I couldn't risk Ethan blurting something out. The consequences would be on my shoulders if any harm were to come to them.

Ethan had no idea just what kind of trouble he and Shaun were in while in the very presence of that girl. They didn't know who she was or what she was capable of. Worse still, they didn't understand what drove her. I did.

The basement door opened at the peak of the stairs and down came Gregory, complaisant and somewhat cheerful today. He walked to his work bench without glancing in my direction.

"Gregory, I'm sorry," I said.

He still didn't look in my direction. He skimmed across the tools on their pegs and picked up a chisel.

"You can't have a life if you're holding on to the past," I said. "Just let go."

"Don't speak," he said.

"I'm sorry," I said again. He flipped the chisel in his hand and lifted up a hammer.

"No, you're not," he said. He walked up the stairs and paused before his face would vanish. "But you will be, and Ethan, too."

He shut the door behind him and I looked down at the phone. 5:23 pm. The lack of light from the windows told me that they had to be boarded. My thumb hovered over Ethan's name as I debated the choices before me. Gregory spoke of hope for Ethan and Shaun, but I'd already mapped out his mind and I knew that he was going to kill them anyway; his mind was already made up.

I pressed the number and the ringing resonated through the speakers of the phone. I wasted no time pass from the answering click to my first words.

"Ethan, whatever you do don't say my name, and don't let on that it's me." There was no reply from his end. "Is Anna there? If yes, say your Boss' name, if she's not then say your mother's name."

"Yes, Mr. Scholermann, I have that document upstairs," he said. "Shaun, will you and Anna come watch this sauce for me? I need to go upstairs and find something."

I sighed with relief; Ethan at least had the sense to know when something was wrong, no matter how angry he was with me at the moment. After hearing a few incidental shuffles and the comforting click of a door, Ethan hushed his voice.

"What the hell is going on, Norman? Where the fuck have you been?"

"Listen to me; Anna and Gregory aren't who you think they are, and you are in danger if you stay in that house with her."

"What?"

"I've been kidnapped. I'm being held in Gregory's basement. He wants to kill me, and he's going to kill you and Shaun as well." Ethan was silent on the other line. "He set me up, Ethan, that's what happened."

"Are you hurt?" He asked.

"Yes."

"Are you safe?"

"For now," I said sullenly. I didn't think I was going to have much longer to worry about being 'safe' – I'd be dead. "You need to get Anna out of the house in any way that you can and get Shaun out of the house."

"Jesus," Ethan sighed. I could hear the stress in his words, and his very voice.

"Don't waste too much time, and act normal. Do whatever you can to get out of that house without raising questions. If she tries to stop you, do what you have to." He didn't say anything, and I didn't expect him to. Ethan never had words for these situations.

"What are you going to do?" He asked quietly.

"Do you trust me?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Then just worry about you and Shaun. I love you both."

I hung up and that was that. I trusted Ethan to be able to pull off their escape. He would make sure that his son was safe, first and foremost, that's what counted. I wished that I could help them, and it pained me to know that I was only a few houses away. But I had done enough to Ethan and Shaun; getting them involved in this mess was bad enough.

The basement door opened. I turned off the backlight on the phone and stared at the wall ahead of me.

"Were you just on the phone?" Gregory asked.

"Were _you_ just on the phone?" I asked.

"No," he said.

"Well then you know that I wasn't on the phone since obviously I hadn't called you," I said. Gregory seemed to find that humorous, he even chuckled a little. He reversed the chair, facing the back spokes toward me, and sat leaning against them. He put his elbows on the rim and smiled as he stared back at me. "You look terrible."

"I feel worse," I said.

"You were an FBI agent, right?"

"Yeah," I said. "You knew that, of course."

"Yeah, I did," he nodded drolly. "Tell me, how many people have you shot?"

"Not a lot," I said.

"Not a lot?"

"Yeah, not a lot. Whatever you consider a lot, not below that."

Gregory found that funny as well. "See? I knew that I liked you. You're a cool guy." He leaned forward, and that grave, stern zombie returned, staring me in the eyes without so much as a smile. "How many people have you killed? I'm guessing it's _not a lot_."

"Two," I said.

"Who were they?" Gregory asked. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to. Just say 'it's none of your fucking business' if you don't want to."

"Well, Gregory, it's none of your fucking business. But you already know who one of them was," I said.

"Yeah, I know. I also happened to look up your other big kill," Gregory said. "Scott Shelby, retired detective and private investigator. Why did he deserve to die?"

"He was a murderer," I said. Gregory nodded thoughtfully, tapping his temple.

"Well if murder is a signed conviction then that's one pro against the cons of my list of reasons to kill you," he said. "And who was the other victim?"

"You know her name," I said. He smiled.

"I want to hear it from you," he said.

I gripped the arm of the chair in my left hand, and the phone in my right. I wondered if Ethan was already packing? Was Anna home yet?

"Say the name," Gregory repeated, still quiet but shaky. His voice trembled. I sat silently, staring at the phone. "Say the name!"

"Julianna Breslin," I said.

"Julianna Breslin. Thirty-two years-old, mother of two, and a wife. My wife," he said. "But you knew that, didn't you?"

"Yes," I said. "I read the name on the business card, I knew who you were. I knew why I was here in this chair."

"I bet you did," Gregory said coldly. "So two people."

"Two people," I said.

"There's no way that there could've been a possible third?"

"No, just two. I'm telling you the truth," I said. Gregory slapped his hands together and laughed.

"Well the truth is complicated, sometimes it isn't easy to figure out," he said. I shrugged with a snort.

"What the hell's so complicated about it? It's the truth."

Everybody's got one. You've got your truth, I've got mine, you say two people, but who knows if that's the answer?"

"It's two," I said. He nodded.

"Okay, two people."

"I'm sorry about what happened to your wife and your family," I said.

"Only because now it involves yours."

He stood up and headed for the door.

"What's the prognosis on the questions?" I asked. "Are Ethan and Shaun safe or not?"

"That was only the first round," he said distantly. "I haven't decided yet."

He shut the door, and I was left alone with my thoughts once again. I wanted to call Ethan again, and it took every fiber of self-control not to press the call button. But if I called it'd be a distraction, and I couldn't risk being one if he was to make it out of this in one piece.

I drifted off to sleep after nodding for a while. I was still so damn hungry, and sleeping helped me keep my mind off of the pain in my stomach.

I think I had a dream, but I couldn't remember it very clearly. I was walking through a field, a golden field of tall wheat stalks. On the borderline of this field, I was a forest, dark and lonely. I walked through the field, and it felt more like gliding or swimming. When I reached the trees, all bare of leafs with mossy trunks and branches like thorns, I wandered through. I was calling out for someone, so that I didn't have to feel alone anymore. And I saw a house in the near distance, a dark log cabin embraced by misty eaves of fog that floated motionlessly in tiers.

I reached out for the door handle and twisted the knob, pushing it aside. I stepped inside and found myself in a grey, bare office. Out of the window was a rainy city. There was a desk in one corner, and a therapy couch on the opposite wall.

A woman stood beside the window, draped in a long red satin robe with intricate chrysanthemums adorned in the material. She looked over her shoulder at me, and smile. Her short hair fell just above her tired, worn eyes. And she spoke, yet her mouth never moved.

"I've found you," she said.

Blood ran down my chin and neck. I looked down, and watched it cover my chest. When I opened my mouth, I watched my teeth fallout, all of them bouncing vigorously like die.

Fire flashed behind my eyes and burned my lungs as I jolted upright and awoke from the outlandishly surreal dream. The flashing I'd seen as fire in my dream was the phone. It vibrated in my hand, and it almost slipped out of my grasp. I quickly pressed the answer button and put it on speakerphone.

"Yeah?"

"Norman." Ethan whispered my name and it sent my heart fluttering.

"Ethan, why are you calling me?" I asked.

"I just wanted to let you know that we're all right, Anna didn't suspect anything and we left," he said. "I've got Shaun in a motel room, I'm in my car."

"What time is it?" I asked.

"1:47 am," he said. "Are you okay?"

"If I said yes, would you believe me?" I asked. He laughed and I closed my eyes, imagining myself right next to him.

"Is there a way into Gregory's basement from the outside?" Ethan asked.

"Why? What the hell does that matter?"

"Because I'm sitting right across the street," Ethan said. I swallowed, and panic knotted my stomach. "I'm going to get you out of there."

"No," I said. "No, no, no – Ethan, get the fuck away from this house, as far away from this house as you can. Go back to your motel room, make sure Shaun is safe, and call the police."

"I'm not calling the police until I get you out of there," he said. "You said that Gregory is going to kill you. If he is set on it, then when he hears the police knocking on his door he'll kill you first so he won't miss his chance. I'm not going to risk you to that."

"Ethan, if there's ever been a time that you listen to me now is it. Please, just do as I say and stay the hell away from here."

"If you're not going to help me then I'll have to find my way in on my own," he said.

"Ethan, stop!"

"I'm crossing the street now," he said.

"Turn around and go back."

"All the lights are out – I'm going around to the back yard to try the back door."

"Ethan, listen to me right now!" I hadn't expected to be so hysterical. Something restless inside of me raised the hairs all over my body at the thought of Ethan here of all places, in the devil's lair.

"The back door is unlocked… I'm in the kitchen. I see a door near the hallway, it looks like it might lead to the basement."

"Ethan, please, I'm begging you to just walk out the door. I know you're close, and you want to help, but just leave me here and walk away."

"It's not the basement, it's a pantry," he said. "I'm in the hall, there's a door at the end."

"Whatever you do, be as quiet as you possibly can," I said.

"I'm opening the door, there's a set of stairs and a light on at the bottom."

I broke out in a sweat all over my body at the notion of Ethan being here with me. "I'm here, Ethan, I'm here."

"Norman?"

"I'm here, I'm here…" I practically cried, I was so happy to be free of this.

"Norman, you're not here," he said. "I'm looking around the basement, and I don't see you anywhere."

No. I'm not there. I was somewhere else, and Ethan was alone in the house of the man that intended to kill him.

"I hear something," he said.

"Run," I said. "Run, run as fast as you can."

I heard Ethan's footsteps as he walked up the stairs, and then I heard a strange, gurgled grunt. His phone fell and hit the floor.

"Ethan?"

There was no sound on the other line.

"Ethan, please answer me."

"Hello, Mr. Jayden." Anna. Her voice made my innards writhe like snakes in a pit; anger flooded my veins. "You messed up."

I heard a click, and the line was dead.

The moments after that finalizing click became an eternity as I pondered the endless possibilities of Ethan's fate. None of them ended well, and all began with my own mistakes. My faults had led to blame, and death only begets more death, like an insatiable hunger spewed forth from the darkest, infantile laws of the world.

Mourning was all I had to cling to in my prison. I wept an endless stream of tears, a lost lifetime's worth. It was a tangible thing, to feel a life slip one's grasp. Shadows replaced hopes. Plans and possibilities became empty vats in a void that was to be ours. As shameful was it was to admit it, even to myself, I had no hope for Ethan. I prayed with every bit of my being that he was alive, but I was not expecting to see him alive again. The brand of hate that the Breslins were dunk on was not forgiving, or understanding. And when they spoke, only blackness remained in their eyes.


	5. Chapter 5: Dreamers

5. Dreamers

The basement door swung wide open, and I watched Gregory stumble down the stairs with a fistful of Jack No. 7. He flipped on the light above my head and sat in the chair in front of me.

"Where's Ethan?" I asked.

"You should've just played ball," he said. He took a swig and sighed.

"Where's Ethan?" I demanded.

"He and Shaun could've been all right, but now… Now we have to do them in, too," Gregory said. "I've never thought about killing a kid before."

"I swear on my life that if you touch Shaun I will hunt you down and I will not rest until I snap your neck myself," I said.

"There's that killer emerging, always right on time," he said. Greg leaned forward and took another swig; I heard the glass clink against his teeth as he desperately drank himself deeper and deeper into depression. "How did it feel to kill my wife? To gun her down right in front of her child?"

"Where's Ethan?" I asked.

"Did you have any remorse? Did you even shed a tear?"

"Where's my family?"

"I should kill you right now, I should," Gregory said. He stood up and swayed back and forth a bit until he gained his balance. He stepped forward, grabbed my hair and yanked my head back. "I should cut through your throat and watch you bleed."

He let go and took his seat again. He lifted the bottle to his lips, but paused when he took a whiff of the air. His nose crinkled up, and he shook his head, gagging.

"What the fuck is that smell?" He asked. He sniffed again and leaned forward. "Is that you? When the hell did that happen?"

"Well what did you expect to happen?" I asked. "You're the kidnapper, you should have thought this through."

"Well excuse me for forgetting about that area but this isn't exactly my career!" Gregory said.

"Oh, right, you're a chef-slash-carpenter-slash-psychiatrist," I said. "Just give me a wash cloth and some pants; I can take care of the rest."

"No," Gregory said.

"What do you mean _no?_ I've been sitting in my own shit for four hours – SHIT!"

"I can't let you out of the chair," Gregory said.

"Why the fuck not? I'm asking for a wash cloth, not a gun," I said. "Did you think that when you kidnap someone their bodily functions just stop? You thought of the tape, and boarding up the windows, you should've planned this, too."

"All right, shut up already," Gregory said. He sat the whiskey on the cement floor and paced back and forth, running his hands through his hair. "This is how it's going to go; I take off the tape, you don't move. We go upstairs and I take you to the bathroom, you don't move. I step outside the bathroom, and you don't move until I say you move. You put your dirty clothes into the garbage bag, you take a shower, you towel off, and then you put on the clean clothes. You lay face down on the floor with your hands behind your back, and you do not move. I will come in, I will cuff you, and I will take you out. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Now Norman, I've never been in your situation before but I imagine that while you're in there it will be impossible not to think about every way you can get out of this. And I understand that, it's human nature. But it's acting on those thoughts that will lead to trouble."

So there I stood in a dim and dingy bathroom. The wallpaper was stained and peeling, curling down at the corners like fingers clawing in vain. The toilet looked clean enough, just stained around the edges like the wallpaper. I stripped and tried not to gag at the thick mucky mess in what used to be my underwear. I dropped them in the bag provided and stepped into the shower. That warm water had been the first luxury I was able to enjoy in a couple of days, and I stood there relaxing my tense muscles and enjoying the feeling of the water running down my body.

I was afraid. I didn't want to admit it to myself - _couldn't_ admit it to myself up until now. But I was deeply afraid of what was going to happen now. I was scared to the bone of what was going to happen to Ethan; any move I made put him in harm's way now. If it was just me in this mess I could fight back, try and get out of there knowing that only my life was at risk. But if I tried anything now, this sickly twisted family could hurt Ethan. They could perform any terrible and inhumane act upon him that they pleased.

I turned off the water and stood in the steaming heat for a few minutes to gather my nerves. I checked the bathroom for anything that I could grab to fight him off and get to Gregory's house before him and his daughter could hurt Ethan. Nothing in the bathroom, not even a mirror to break in and use a shard. I was going to have to use my hands for this one. I slipped on the sweat pants and t-shirt that Gregory had provided.

"Are you dressed?" Gregory asked.

"Yes," I said. I stood behind the door.

"Are you on the floor with your hands behind your back?"

"Yes."

The doorknob rattled loosely as he twisted it and pushed the door open. I kicked the door right off of the hinges and right into Gregory. He fell head-first into the bath tub. I didn't even check on him; I ran right out of the door and careened left into the kitchen. I saw a block of knives next to the stove, and slipped them out until I found the smallest and the largest knives of the set. I slipped the small one into my pocket just in case I would need it, and headed back to the bathroom with the large one held firmly in my grip.

Gregory laid still and quiet in the tub as the shattered door covered up most of him. I couldn't be sure if he was alive or dead, but that didn't matter. I had to run outside and find out which street I was on so I knew where to go. I was going to need some help on this one, and I couldn't think of anyone with more resources than Ash. I ran through the house and saw the front door at the end of the hallway. I knew that in the city it wouldn't be hard to flag down a car – hell, even a Taxi would do.

I pushed through the door. Silence.

I squinted against the bright light. When the white faded and the world pushed through the blindness, I saw no tall scrapers or traffic. All that lay before me were dead, wheat-golden pastures and hills as far as the eye could see. I screamed and cursed the sky, though it did no good with no one or anything around to hear it. I had no idea where I was, and I wouldn't even know which direction to run. However, I did see a dirt road along one of the fields, and I knew that Gregory's car had to have been around here somewhere.

I was tackled to the ground, and a strong arm wrapped around my neck and cut off my air as it crushed my windpipe. I clawed at Gregory's elbow, both of us grunting gutturally like wild animals. That was until I remembered the large butcher's knife in my hand.

I brought it up do his forearm and took a quick swipe, slicing his skin open like flaying a fish. He jerked back and let go as he rolled off of me, and I gasped for air.

"You fucking son-of-a-bitch!" Gregory kicked my hand so hard that the knife flew out of my hand. "You stupid fucking bastard!"

He kicked me in my side, but I held his leg against my torso before he could pull back and I rolled as quickly as I could, flipping him over me and right onto the ground. I straddled him and pushed his face into the dirt, pulling out the small knife in my pocket. He happened to fling his leg backward far enough to hit the small of my back, and then flipped me off of him. The blade flung out of my fingers. He came crawling at me like a crazed lizard and started chocking me. I reached for the small knife but sliced my palm open.

Gregory noticed, and then his grip around my neck loosened. That was enough of a distraction for me to swing one good punch into his jaw and knock him off of me. I scrambled for the big knife again and then staggered to my feet, blade pointed at him as he sat up, staring back at me with fear in his eyes. I didn't realize it yet, but he wasn't afraid of me – he was afraid for me.

"Stop," he said. "Please, just don't move."

"I don't think you're in any position to make any fucking orders – now tell me where the fuck Ethan is!" I yelled like a madman. I surprised even myself. But all I could think about was Ethan and getting him out of this mess. "You tell me where he is or I swear on my grave that I will gut you here."

Maybe Gregory was right. Maybe there was a dangerous killer inside of me. Unfortunately for him, it cared about Ethan just as much as I did.

"My blood in on that knife, Norman," Gregory said. "And you've cut your palm on the other. If you don't put it down, you could do something that you'll regret."

He stood, slowly, and kept his hands where I could see them.

"Stay where you are," I warned him.

"Norman, you can't let any of that blood touch your hand, or else you'll be in an even worse position than you already are," he said.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" I asked.

"The blood on that knife is tainted," Gregory said. He looked me in the eye, and the fear was as clear as cellophane. "I'm HIV positive."

"Bullshit," I said.

"Three years ago I tested positive for the HIV virus, and of any of that blood gets into your wound, so will you," he said. I searched his face for any tell tale sign of a liar's gamble. I couldn't find one. I looked down at the blade, covered in his red blood, and I dropped it. It hit the ground with a dull thud and dust stuck to his sticky blood like a fly to nectar.

I looked up, and Gregory grabbed my face as he thrust his forehead into my vision. I fell to the ground under the force of the head-butt, and clutched by nose. It didn't feel broken, but it didn't exactly feel too good after that, either.

I felt woozy, unable to move my arms or legs. I just stared dizzily into the sky as Gregory took my legs and dragged me across the dirt and back into the house.

[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]

The night was cool, and a damp breeze swept across my stomach. I could hear the rain outside the window. I would go and sit at the window to watch if I could, but my wrists and ankles were tied down with four neck-ties. I looked down past my bare torso at my jeans. My phone was in my pocket, but I had no way of getting to it. It may as well have been on the moon.

The door opened and in walked my captor; a child.

"Anna, you have to let me go," I said.

"Don't call me that, Ethan," the girl said.

"All right, _H_ – you can't keep me here without anyone noticing I'm gone," I said.

"Don't you dare call me that, either," she said. "My mom called me H."

"Please," I begged as she walked to the window and looked out over the neighborhood. "Just untie me."

"So that you can leave?" She asked. "Go and tell the cops about what my dad's done?"

"Yes," I said. "What he's doing is wrong, and you don't want to be dragged into it all."

"I don't want to be dragged?" She asked. It was strange. Like she was here, but far away in another place at the same time. "I had a dream about you, Ethan. I came you your house like I always did, but this time no one else was there. And I found you in the bath tub, and you wanted me to come in. I undressed, and got in with you."

"Stop," I said. I looked away and stared at the opposite wall. "I don't want to hear this. You're a child, just a kid."

"The water was ice cold, but at the same time we didn't care. You just held me there, and I slept in your arms against you. You were so warm," she said. I heard the bed creak, and I glanced up to see the girl putting one knee onto the bed and crawling over me until she straddled my waist, staring down at me with a far-off and vacant expression. "But when I woke up, you were cold. And when I opened my eyes, all of the water had turned red. You were still breathing, barely, and you stared into my eyes. I watched the life bleed out of you in your last moments until your heart stopped beating."

She leaned down, her hair tickling my face as her nose hovered just inches from mine.

"I leaned in and kissed you before I woke up to reality. But even when I woke up, I could still feel your cold, lifeless lips against mine. I never forgot that feeling." She ran her fingers down my chest, and I looked away in disgust. "I know that a part of that dream was real, and I know that you've had those dreams, too."

"No," I said.

"When I was a girl, I had a dream of my mom. She was running through dark trees, trying to get away from this silver monster. It was faster than lightning, a demon like the wind. And then when she saw the monster coming for me, she jumped in the way and the demon jumped right through her chest. She lay dying at my feet, and I knew that it was going to happen," she said. She pressed her cheek against mine and blew an eerie secret into my ear. "The next day, your boyfriend shot her with a different kind of silver demon, right through her chest. I watched her die."

She sat up and her hands raked down my stomach.

"Ever since then I've dreamed of the man who shot her, I never forgot him face," she said. "And then I dreamed of you. And I know you've dreamed of me."

"No," I said again.

"You and me, we're the same," she said. "We dream of bad people and see what they're going to do. And when we came into each other's lives, we started having the same dreams. And what happens in those dreams is real, Ethan, I know they are."

She slipped her fingers down to the buckle of my belt and slipped the peg out of the strap until it came loose.

"No!" I wriggled under her weight, trying to shake her off of me, but my bonds made it impossible. She snaked the belt out of my pant loops in one yank and held the belt in both of her hands.

"I've never met anyone else that can do what I can do; someone who dreams of things that are, and things that will come true. Someone who dreams of the monsters who kill innocent people," she said. "I want to dream of making love to you."

"Anna, you don't know what you're talking about," Ethan said. "You're too young to know what you're saying."

"But I'm not too young to know that we're the same," she said. "Who did you dream of dying when you received your gift?"

I looked up into her eyes, and I could see the raw sincerity there. She meant every word she'd said – knew exactly what she was talking about. And she'd sniffed out my secret like a bloodhound.

"My son," I said. I closed my eyes and bit down on my jaw to keep from showing her just how much it pained me to remember Jason. "The first time I had a dream like that, it was the night before I watched my son die right in front of me. I tried to save him, but… It was too late."

"And who did you bond with after he died?" She asked. "Who was the monster you dreamed of after that?"

"His name was Scott Shelby," I said. "He was a retired detective and a Private Investigator for hire. He was… The Origami Killer. I would have these dreams of running underwater, trying to save these poor kids, but then I'd see his shadow and I wouldn't be able to move. I'd wake up in the street, standing wet and soaked in the rain."

"And you only stopped feeling that pain once he was dead," she said.

I nodded. There was no use in trying to lie about anything, Anna clearly knew what she was talking about.

"Unfortunately my monster still haunts me," she said. "I've dreamed of Norman Jayden for years, and every night I see the things he's done, and the things he will do. It's how I found him after all of this time – and it's how I saw you for the first time."

"Anna, he's not a bad man," I said. "What happened to your mother was an accident. It wasn't right, I'm not defending that, but he's not a monster."

"There's an evil inside of him," she said. "It sleeps inside of him, I've seen it. It's going to kill my dad."

"No," Ethan said. "I know him better than anyone. He wouldn't harm your dad if he could help it. He's a healer, not a monster."

"How do you know?" She asked.

"Because I love him. I trust him." I looked her in her eyes, trying to get my point across. I knew that the most honest answer came from looking into someone's eyes. And she would see no doubt there when I told her that I loved and trusted Norman with my life.

"I'm not calling you a liar," she said. "But Dreamers like you and me, we know too much. Death follows us like a wolf, and we have to accept that the ones we love will either die or become monsters."

She leaned down and parted her lips, and I turned my head away. But she grabbed my face and pushed her mouth onto mine before I could struggle. She pulled away and I spit her saliva off of my lips, fighting the urge to gag.

"In my dreams, you've been the only true friend I've had," she said. "Just admit that you had the same dream."

I stared at the rain creeping down the window like serpents. What was the worst thing that could happen at this point?

"Yes," I said. "I had the same dream. I came home, and I saw Norman standing on the porch. He was covered in blood, and he had this… this look in his eyes. He was so sad about whatever he'd done. And I remember knowing what he did, and yet I didn't know, and… I was so _angry_ with him. But I couldn't hate him. I love him too much. So I went upstairs, and ran cold bath water into the tub, and stripped down. I sat inside and waited for the water to fill up past my chest.

"And then you walked in. You looked so sad, and you were crying. I wanted to ask you what the matter was, but I had no voice. So I called you to me, and when you got into the tub your clothes had just vanished. I took you into my arms and held you like a crying babe in my arms. And when you fell asleep, all of that sorrow and pain that had been building up in me finally became too much to bear. I saw a razor on the edge of the tub, and then I just grabbed it and cut my wrists without thinking, over and over again until blood poured out of me."

Anna was crying when I focused on her again.

"You're too good of a person to suffer like this," Anna said. "You're too good to be in love with a monster like Norman. We're an angel, that's why you have this gift of dreaming like I do."

"You don't know him," I said. I hadn't noticed tears in my eyes until a hot streak ran down my face. It was as though we were both linked in our emotions, and both of us felt death in the room. It was so near that I swore that I could see it standing in the corner of the room.

"But I know you," she said. "You were always comforting me in my dreams. When I would cry over my mom, you would tell me all about Jason and how much you missed him. You would tell me things to make my life better, and I love you. I love you so much I'm going to let you dream forever."

She gripped the belt firmly in her hands and laid the strap over my neck.

"Anna, please don't do this," I said. "You can't do this to Shaun."

"He's already dead," she said. "I dreamed it, and so did you."

She pressed down on the belt, and I couldn't breathe. I yanked against the ties to the bed post, but it was no use. She stared into my eyes the entire time, and pressure built in my head as the belt trapped blood into the vessels of my eyes and face.

I heard the rain grow louder, as well as footsteps from somewhere in the house. A door was kicked open, and I heard voices shouting something.

Anna let go of the belt, and I drew in a gasp of air.

"Get off of the bed!" A voice shouted. I saw flashlights across the walls, splashing over Anna's skin like milk.

Though she'd let up on the belt, the presence of death was stronger than ever, and I saw the darkness of its cold stare in the corners of the ceiling above me, just waiting to reach out. When I looked back at Anna, I understood why the shadows were still here; she unclipped a small pocket knife from her waistband.

"No, Anna, don't," I pleaded.

"All I wanted after you held me was to never wake up," she said.

She turned and jumped off of the bed with a shriek. I saw the blade stab into one of the officer's shoulders, and then flashes and bangs filled the room. I looked away as her blood sprayed my body from the exit wounds in her back. The clumps of her body hit the floor, and I squeezed my eyes shut so that I wouldn't have to see the look on the face of her dead body on the floor. The officers were asking me questions as I felt my hands and feet untied, but I couldn't hear them over the voice screaming in my head.

I couldn't say whether there was a better place for her beyond this world, but it couldn't possibly be worse than the hell she'd been living in.

Hands carried me out of the room like angels as they carried me through the hallway and out into the rain. The water cleansed me of her blood, washing away any trace of what happened in that house tonight. But it wouldn't wash away the memories, or the words that Anna had spoken to me. It couldn't wash away the fear that Gregory might have already killed Norman.

I was laid on the grass, and flashlights flooded my vision as EMT's tried to check my hearing and my vision. They kept talking to me but nothing had been absorbed whatsoever. Until I saw a shadow behind them, pushing its way through.

"Dad!" The first word to break its way through the void. "Dad!"

"Shaun," I said. Suddenly I felt the rain hit every inch of my skin, and my arms and legs were in my control again.

I gripped the shirts of the paramedics as I used them to pull my body off of the grass. I pushed the cops away from my son and wrapped my arms around him. He was safe, and alive. I was relieved.

"Thank god you're all right," I sighed into his hair as I held him to me for as long as I could before he tried to pull away.

"I called the police when you didn't come back from Mr. Breslin's house," Shaun said. "Are you okay? Where's Norman?"

"He's not here," I said.

It hadn't really sunk in until now, but I realized that I had no idea where the hell Norman was, or if he was even alive. But somehow I knew that he was, like a 6th sense or something. I just knew that he was still out there, somewhere. But for how long, I couldn't say for sure.

"Don't worry, Shaun, we'll find him."


	6. Chapter 6: Julianna's Nocturne

6. Julianna's Nocturne

Back to square one. Me, tied up in a chair, and Gregory wallowing with a bottle of Jack to his lips. On the plus side, I was upstairs this time, so at least there was some daylight to bask in.

"You know, this was my dad's farm," Gregory said. "This was the piece of shit that he left me. After what he did it was a sorry consolation to leave behind. I promised myself I'd never leave Hannah anything like this. I wanted to do so much good for her, so much right… I wanted to give her the life I didn't have."

"Nice gambit, the HIV thing," I said. "It caught me off guard, and I dropped my knife. You got me. But don't you think that we've had enough of this? Let me go."

"I wasn't lying," Gregory said. "I am HIV positive."

He dragged a stool into the empty living room and sat down, taking a swig of the whiskey in his fist. He stared out the large bay window, watching the sun set over the land.

"You're sure you have it?" I asked.

"Yes. I've been tested three times in the last twenty-one days," he said, taking another swig form his bottle.

My jaw practically fell.

"Three weeks? That's how long you've known that you've had this?" I laughed, but he seemed to ignore it. "No wonder you're acting the way you are – you're in shock."

"I'm in shock?" Gregory asked darkly.

"Yes – you found out that you have HIV and suddenly you're angry at the world, angry at me and Ethan for whatever reason you chose to target us. You're traumatized, I understand."

"I'm traumatized? I thought that I was in shock? This gets worse by the minute," he said dryly.

"Gregory, you need to put some perspective on this," I said. "You have HIV, not AIDS – there's a world of difference."

"Perspective?" He asked, seemingly affronted by the word. "Six years ago I'd landed a job as a child psychiatrist. And I met her. Her name was Virginia, she was my secretary and working toward her bachelor's in psychology. For two years we had this great friendship, this bond that no one else shared with me. Not even Julianna. Eventually our professional relationship became an affair. But not long into it, I ended the relationship.

"Then four weeks ago I get this phone call from her. I hadn't heard a word from her in four years and suddenly she calls for small talk. Unfortunately, it wasn't only small talk. She says that I'm HIV positive and I should get myself checked. It was the first real scare I'd ever had in my life. I couldn't even gather up the courage to get checked for an entire week. I'm sure you can guess what the results were. But that wasn't the worst part of the whole situation; it's what I found out next that turned my entire world upside down.

"I started thinking about Julianna, and how she'd died a year _after_ Virginia and I became intimate. So I started thinking; could I have given it to her, too? She'd been getting tired just before she died, had some swollen lymph nodes, night sweats…

"I called her physician when she was still alive and told him the news that I'd only just learned. I asked him if my wife had ever come to see him about anything strange before she'd died, any sicknesses or concerns she'd had. He told me that she came in about her exhaustion and her swelling and her night sweats and so he took a test – just one test to cover all of the bases. He told me that the last time that he saw her he'd told her that she'd tested positive for HIV. And then he just let her go. He let her go like he'd just told her that she had a cold. How do you tell someone something like that and then just let them go? Scared, confused, and unstable?

"I asked him the date of that visit, and he told me. It was the day before you shot and killed her. So then I started to wonder. Was it really just an accident? Was she really just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and you just happened to miss the guy and hit her? You, a guy who's trained to have precise aim; did you just miss your target that one time? Or was it intentional? Maybe it wasn't an accident at all? Maybe she saw you coming with your gun pointing in her direction and she purposely threw herself in front of your line of fire just so she wouldn't have to face the reality that her husband, the man who's supposed to be faithful and protect her, was the one who'd given her this. Just so she wouldn't have to face the reality that I had fucked someone else – maybe a prostitute, maybe a coworker – and gave her this thing inside that would kill her.

"So she wouldn't have to face the reality that the man she devoted her life to was the one who was killing her from the inside. That's my biggest fear; that she's up there in heaven and she's so sad – so hurt by what she knows about me and what I did."

Gregory threw his empty bottle down on the ground and it shattered, though the sound paled in juxtaposition to the streaks running down his face. "So you talk to me about perspective when you can tell me whether she died incidentally or intentionally."

I stared at the spider-web of shattered glass on the hardwood floor. Gregory walked to the window and stared at the red sun dipping quickly below the horizon.

"Killing me isn't going to change anything," I said. Gregory glanced at me over his shoulder with nothing but contempt for the both of us in his eyes.

"We owe her," he said. "One of us killed her – or both. It really doesn't matter as long as we both get what we deserve."

Through the window, against the heat of the sun, I saw spinning lights of crimson and blue. Gregory hadn't noticed, and I just needed to get his attention long enough to distract him from noticing their approach.

"Gregory," I said, but he didn't budge. He just kept his eyes on the ground outside the window, lost in his remorse. I couldn't think of anything to call him back to reality, I was out of ideas. Until I realized what would hurt him worse than he had hurt Julianna.

"Gregory, what if she had it first?" I asked.

That had definitely caught his attention.

"What if she had it first, and gave it to you, and then you gave it to Virginia?" I asked.

"No," Gregory said, stepping away from the window and staring daggers at me. What mattered was that I had stolen his attention. "No, that's not possible."

"She was showing signs years before you'd even found out, it makes perfect sense," I said.

"You shut your fucking mouth before I cut it off!"

"You don't want to kill me," I said. "If you'd really planned this all to end in our deaths then you wouldn't have given two shits about warning me that your blood was HIV positive."

Gregory fell silent, and he didn't move for quite some time. That was until he'd noticed red, white, and blue lights make his shadow dance along the wall.

"You should have seen this coming," I said. "Once the police knew that it was you they checked for any property that you own to come searching for you."

"It doesn't matter," he said. "Whether I expected this or not, the ending's the same."

Gregory walked into the kitchen, and I looked out the window. Cops opened their car doors and knelt behind them for cover, aiming their guns. I saw them take note of me and get the message out via walkies. I was so relieved to see them. But then I heard Gregory's boots stomp into the room, bottle of vodka in one hand and a propane tank in the other.

"We do this together, Norman," he said. He twisted off the bottle cap and poured half the bottle of vodka over himself. Then he threw the other half down at the whiskey near my feet and sat the propane tank down beside him.

Once I saw the lighter out of his pocket, I swallowed hard.

"Gregory, you can still stop. In your state of mind, your mental condition, you can still get out of this and have a normal life – I can vouch on your behalf that this was just an episode due to you being scared and confused."

His thumb struck the flint, and the flame quivered underneath his calm, steady breaths.

"See you on the other side," Gregory said.

He closed his eyes and dropped the lighter.


	7. Chapter 7: Monsters

A/N: Just a quick in-betweener to catch me up and let you know that I'm returning to this to finish it.

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A jolt to my body, my muscles tense, and cold sweat washes over my skin. Another nightmare.

I guess that's the price you pay when you're a bad man.

I could still feel the flames licking the scars that had smoothed the skin on my shins. The minute that lighter had hit the floor, both Gregory and I were engulfed in the hell that we'd both created. He was swallowed up whole, running around the room as he breathed in the flames that ate away at his flesh until they seared his throat and lungs so badly that his voice faded into silence. He still writhed, even after his lungs had been taken from him, until he stilled beside me like a boar.

I couldn't remember everything as vividly now, but I do remember screaming as white hot fire burned away the material around my legs and burned my feet and my skin. I couldn't move with my legs and arms bound to the chair, I could only endure the justice that had been handed to me as I waited for the fire to rise and devour the rest of my body. My death would be a slow one, nowhere near as merciful as Gregory's death. God and his angels had turned their heads to my pleas; monsters deserved to burn in the fires from whence they came. Still, I cried out for anyone who would listen to me begging for deliverance.

I remember feeling tears of pity rain down from the sky; buckets of water had been cast upon the crown of my head to douse the flames at my feet, and my hands and feet were unbound. The pain was unbearable as my burnt legs dangled between the brave officers who'd come for me.

A year later these legs could still recall that pain, the likes of which I'd never felt, but they couldn't really feel anything else. Honestly, I was just happy to still have my legs. But even Ethan's touch, when he would run his fingers along the contours of the scars and puckered pink skin, remained unfelt. He didn't wake up this time, which was rare. I always felt guilty over depriving him of his sleep over my own stupid dreams. He practically worked himself into his grave every day of the week at his firm, and sleep was his only refuge. I didn't like being the one who deprived him of his haven away from his responsibilities. But he never complained, and whenever he was dead exhausted the next morning he never blamed me or even took his stress out on me.

The moment I became fully aware in the hospital was the only memory that wasn't clouded up by a fog. My legs burned so badly that the first thing out of my mouth was a slew of _fucks_ and curses. And just like that, Ethan was there. I remember feeling his arms around me, pulling me up into his embrace, clinging to me like a babe to its mother. And as soon as he let go, Shaun was right there to replace him. I remember laughing; I guess I'd just never realized how much Shaun really appreciated me until he thought I was dead. I loved the hell out of that kid and I squeezed him back because I couldn't believe how fortunate we all had been to survive that nightmare. I was just glad that Shaun and Ethan were all right, and if I had to suffer some second-degree burns in order to keep them alive then it was just the way things had to be.

This was my family, and I'd do whatever it took to keep them safe and sound. But in the weeks that followed, I began to wonder: did monsters deserve families?

Monsters were born in many ways; the death of a spouse, guilt, desires, being victimized, even drugs… My monster was like a father to Gregory's darkness. I'd created the monster inside of him and it destroyed his entire family. It had cost his daughter her entire future. I suppose that was why I'd grieved over them both for so long. Like a grieving father, I felt that I should have died in Gregory's place.

Monsters were born in many ways, and once they were inside of you they never left, I knew that now. I thought my monster was dead but he returned to me, escaped the darkest reaches of my mind. And I knew that I owed him a huge thanks because he'd awakened a part of me that I'd let go a long time ago.

My monster had been born of my ambitions: my instincts, my wits, my will to live. And when I'd cast him away after what happened to Madison I lost that ambition. I settled into being a shadow, and it had been reflected in my job and my life. He'd only returned because he knew that it had been long enough for me to realize that I needed him if I ever wanted to be anything close to the man I'd worked so hard to be since I was a kid. It was because of Him that I was able to fight off Gregory. I hated to admit it, but it was Him that had really saved us all.

Now he demanded tribute.

"I helped you, Norman; now you help me," He said.

He wanted to live again. He wanted to be unchained, to be a part of the world again, like when I was on Tripto. It would never be the same as it used to be, the drug wouldn't give him such unrestrained control over me. But he knew that if I accepted him that he would have just enough influence to really make a difference for the both of us. And I knew that if I didn't accept him as a part of me then I wouldn't ever recover from the ghosts that haunted me.

In order to climb my way back up to the gates of Heaven, I had to immerse myself in the blood of my own demon; I had to become the monster that I'd been fighting all along.

I was a monster, and nothing could change what had already been done. I just had to strive to keep the beast in check and make sure Ethan never had to suffer for it.


	8. Chapter 8: Doll's Eyes

8. Doll's Eyes

Oh, nicotine; sweet and bitter at the same time. It calmed my nerves like cool ointment on a burn, which was something I had particularly intimate knowledge of. Was it unhealthy? Of course. Did I care? Not a chance. You see, Sometimes I get this aching feeling, towards the back of my neck. A good ol' fashioned cigarette is the only thing that seems to soothe the beast. Of course I couldn't smoke as long as I lived with Ethan. He'd never supported it and did his best to remind me that backsliding on simple addictions like cigarettes could lead my addictive personality to slightly larger slips. And as a man who'd studied psychology extensively to become a criminal profiler, I knew that Ethan was absolutely right. But damn it, he was over 5,000 miles away and I was having a rough week.

I stood on the balcony just outside the break room that overlooked the parking lot. The weather was as muggy as one could expect, but the few raindrops that filtered through the charcoal clouds didn't bother me. It was the wind that broke a man. It cut right through hair, skin, and flesh, and wrapped the bones in an icy chill that only a strong, raven-black coffee could thaw.

I glanced over my shoulder and peered through the sliding glass doors. All I saw were four young airheads snickering and tossing glances my way as they chatted away like bitchy schoolgirls. The simple fact was that I hated my new job. When I decided to get back into therapy and psych evaluations I thought it would be the best move for myself and my family. But starting out wasn't exactly easy. I got a job in a psychology firm to help me get back into the game, and help me build a reputation so that one day I could go it solo. Turns out I was an old salty dog among young-guns, fresh out of college and still without a sense of the real world. Half of them were trust-fund kids, which was an entirely different frame of mind I wouldn't even want to begin to evaluate them.

To them I was nothing more than the geezer. I'd be turning forty next week. I wasn't old, I was still in my prime - sure, the down-swing of it, but prime nonetheless. I was still a fit guy, could handle my own in a brawl if need be, but that didn't matter. As far as they were concerned I was one of the fucking Skeksis. Well as it was put, _I'm still the emperor!_

But Ethan was proud of me, and happy _for_ me. That made a world of difference. No matter how much the problems of my patients dragged me down and wore my emotions thin, Ethan's approval and support, his pride, rejuvenated me. He kept this old lion's mane intact, and always reminded me that I was his king. And boy, did he treat me like one.

I thought of calling him while I was on my last break of the day, but it already almost 4pm here, meaning it'd practically be midnight in Dusseldorf, Germany. Ever since he'd made partner two years ago, he'd been traveling more and more. It used to be fun when I could go with him and we could laugh on the seine and share a bottle of Chateau Blanc before breaking in the hotel bed with a night of passion. Waking up with Ethan as the first rays of sunlight poured the shadow of the Eiffel Tower across out warm, embracing bodies would always be one of my favorite memories. But now that I had a 9-to-5 in the figurative (and quite literal) sense of the term, we were apart more often than we were together. He assured me that after his project in Dusseldorf was finished he wouldn't need to travel abroad so often. But I recall him saying the same thing about the Paris project.

Success, like every good thing in life, had its trade-offs. And in order for Ethan's good fortune and talents to flourish and soar, I needed to step back and let him fly. He deserved that much and more.

I checked my watch; 3:45pm. I had just one last session for the day, and then I could clock out and head on home. Shaun would be there by now, unless he'd decided to go over to a bud's house for a while. Personally I usually didn't like it when he did. Not because I had anything against his friends or his social life, but mainly because the kid was a natural chef and enjoyed cooking. And when he stayed home he usually had something new for me to try by the time I got home. Now that he was sixteen and close to getting his driver's license, I feared the day that I would have to give up the sweet flavors of homemade Chicken Marsala and go back to packets of Ramen. I knew every baby bird has to fly from the nest, but damnit, couldn't baby bird pop a bird in the oven and stick it in the 'fridge for me before he went to the movies?

I put out the butt of my cigarette and exhaled, letting the last breath of soothing sensations flow through my nose. The door opened behind me, and I turned to see one of the young hot-shot doctors walk out onto the small balcony. She was a slender girl, with shoulder-length brown hair and amber-brown eyes. Her brittle-looking hair, thin nails, and worn teeth told me that she had a history of psychological issues herself, and her frail frame would probably be a reminder of that time of her life for years to come. Oh, she wasn't hideous or repulsive, she was actually quite pretty. Just a bit to frail, her cheeks a bit too gaunt, her eyes a bit too sunken.

"Did you need to borrow a smoke?" I asked. The more I shared the pack, the better, since I didn't really want to smoke an entire pack before Ethan came home this weekend.

"No, I don't smoke," she said. Of course not, the new generation was as bad as Ethan when it came to being health-conscious. Ethan wouldn't even let me eat hamburgers anymore because charbroiling meat produced some of the most potent mutagens and carcinogens known. He didn't want me getting a side of cancer with my Happy Meal, as he put it. Of course that didn't stop me from sneaking out of the house at 2am and eating a cold stashed burger behind the tool shed now and then.

"I'm Leslie," she said, holding out her hand. I shook it warily.

"Norman," I said. "You haven't said a word to me over the last three months..."

I immediately felt like a dick for blatantly pointing that out. But she was a good sport about it and laughed it off.

"I'm sorry. I know that probably seemed really lame of me."

Yeah, totally _lame_.

"It's no problem, I guess I'm not the nicest guy to approach sometimes. The popular clique says I'm crabby because I'm missing Matlock," I laughed. The really sad part was that I did enjoy the occasional Matlock marathon on the weekends. Not that they knew that, and not that I'd admit it to anyone under the sun. The only person who knew was Ethan, and that was only because he'd walked into our bedroom one Saturday afternoon and found me curled up in my pajama bottoms and a bowl of popcorn between my legs. We now have an understanding.

"No, no, it's not that, it's just, um..."

She stepped awkwardly from heel to heel, and tucked a lock of hair behind her head. This place really was beginning to feel like High School, what with the popular kids and the well-meaning bulimic girl chatting me up like she was going to ask me to prom. I actually had to stop myself from looking up to make sure that there wasn't a bucket of pig's blood hovering over my head.

"You're kind of... my hero," she said.

"Me? A hero?" I didn't mean to laugh in her face, it just sort of stumbled out on its own. Me, the ex-druggie FBI fuck-up who had a knack for putting his loved ones in danger? "I think you're mistaken, kiddo."

"You _are_ Norman Jayden, aren't you? the same guy who shot the Origami Killer, Scott Shelby?" She asked. At that, I surrendered a reluctant nod and leaned back against the wrought iron railing. "You might not realize this, but you're actually, like, _really_ famous. Scott Shelby is one of the most profiled cases in criminal psychology now - we studied the case right alongside Ed Gein."

"So I'm a teaching tool now, huh? A history lesson to the future generation on how to get yourself killed?"

"You should feel lucky. History never remembers the ones who caught the predator," she said. "I mean, you know who Ed Gein, Ted Bundy, and Jeffrey Dahmer are, but could you tell me who their arresting officers were? What the names were of the men who risked their lives to make sure that the rest of us could sleep at night?"

She had a point, even I had no clue, and this was my field of expertise.

"Heroes are so easily forgotten once the monster's been caged. Everybody immediately wants to punish the bad man who killed their friends or loved ones that no one ever bothers to thank the guys who made it possible."

What did this little girl know of monsters? Did she know that she was standing right next to one? That this so-called hero had a darkness inside of him that would snap her neck and toss her aside if she was standing in its way?

She stood beside me, hands on the wet metal of the balcony and eyes gazing over the city.

"Those assholes in there sitting around that table have no fucking clue just who you are and why they should show you more respect than they've given you. And I haven't said a damn word in your defense, and for that, Mr. Jayden, I'm sorry."

"I really think you're building up the wrong idea about me in that head of yours," I said. I shoved my hands into the pockets of my slacks and glanced her way. "I really appreciate everything you've said, but you should know that I'm not some noble guy who took down some demon. I'm a man who got lucky, and shot a guy who needed some serious help. The kind of help that he should have gotten in a place like this. And even then, we both know that probably wouldn't have stopped him from what he did in the end. Oh, and I also happen to be a bit of an prick when I'm drunk. I'm just a normal guy trying to make a living and support his family."

"I can appreciate your point of view, sir," she said. "But before you just walk away and continue thinking that you're a nobody, let me tell you why you're somebody. That son of a bitch, he snatched my nephew from a bust stop and stuck him down a fucking grate. He left him there for four days to starve, to thirst, to piss and shit himself because he had nowhere else to go. And that was just the physical torture. Can you imagine how hard it must have been to be twelve years old and know that you're going to die? Johnny had four days to think about how he would never grow up. To think about how he would never see his friends again, how sad his mom would be to know that he was dead. He had four fucking days to accept the fact that he was going to die alone, and there was nothing he could do about it.

"I hated that sadistic prick, and I wanted to kill him myself. I swore that if I ever found a name that I would. When they found Johnny's body, I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep, I just felt rage in every breath. I was so angry because there was nothing me or my sister could do to bring Johnny back, or to punish the fucker who took him away from us. It wasn't until after you finally killed him that I was able to find peace again. You made me want to go into psychology, and one day I hope to apply for the FBI. You helped me live again when I only wanted to die. And I can only imagine how many other fathers, mothers, aunts, uncles, sisters, brothers, and friends felt the same way. You're not a nobody, Mr. Jayden. I just wanted to say thank you."

I wanted to joke off the moment by pointing out what a mouth she had on her. I thought Blake was bad. But in the end, she'd left me speechless. In fact, I felt a tug in my chest that I couldn't ignore, and I had to take a few deep breathes to keep calm and cool.

"Anyway, I just wanted to say that..." She stuffed her hands into her jeans and trudged toward the door.

"Hold on," I said. I grabbed her shoulder, and she paused. "I, uh... Look. Thank you. Thanks for everything you said, that really means a lot to me."

No one had ever really sincerely thanked me apart from Ethan. Honestly, it did feel good inside.

"Was your sister's name Lauren?"

"Yeah, Lauren Winter," she said.

"I never met her," I admitted. I'd read details about her and her life, but I'd never actually met the woman herself. "How is she?"

"She's dead. About a year ago she hit rock bottom. My parents were trying to get her to move back home, but she'd just kind of given up on herself, you know? Took a little too much black tar heroin and that's all she wrote."

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Anyway, if you, uh, ever want a lunch buddy to sit and talk about whatever, I'm always at the table by the microwave." She left with a kind of optimism that kept me on my toes. I couldn't be bothered to attempt to feel half as cheerful after the gruesome picture of Johhny's slow death she'd painted for me.

My last appointment of the day was punctual, already waiting for me in my office as I made my way inside and shook what water there was out of my hair.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Lynch, I hope you weren't waiting too long," I said. I settled behind my desk and took in the vision of my brand new patient. Most people were uptight and nervous during their first session with me, but she looked as though she felt right at home. She wore a long red pea coat wrapped tightly around her frame, and long stalking-clad legs that emerged from the bottom. White heels were propped up on the arm of my couch, and she unwrapped the scarf that had donned her head, revealing short blonde hair. From a first glance I would have guessed about forty years old, but taking her in over the course of thirty seconds I noticed crevices and wrinkles carved into her flesh that told me she was probably just over fifty.

"That's all right, Twenty-One, I'm just happy to be here," she said.

"I'm Norman Jayden, you can call me Norman. I'd like us to be friends, here, Ms. Lynch, and so I was wondering if it'd be all right to call you Claire?"

"Call me whatever you'd like to, Twenty-One, I'm happy with anything," she said. The smile across her cherry-red lips was a bit unnerving. In fact a chill shot right down my spine. Her file said that she was severely depressed and spend every moment of her life crying and sleeping after her daughter had been abducted and never found. She sounded perfectly fine, polite, aware of acceptable social behaviors and most certainly smiling.

"Claire, I have to admit that I'm a little surprised. I wasn't expecting you to be so lovely and charming when your file tells me that you're a possible danger to yourself and others due to your outstanding depression."

"Oh, I'm not depressed," she said, that ever-gleaning smile shining brilliantly beneath her wide blue eyes. They were almost dead, like a doll's eyes.

"Then I'm a little confused; why are you here and why would Dr. Truman say that you are?"

"Because I was, but I'm not any more. Not anymore." She stood up and sauntered up to my desk, sashaying her hips and walking slowly, rhythmically, as though strutting to a melody that I couldn't hear. She sat on the edge and leaned in close. "I'm actually _very_ happy, now that I've found you, Twenty-One. I've been searching for you for so long, and now that I'm finally here it feels as though everything leading up to this moment has been a dream."

"Have we met before?" I asked.

"In dreams, I walk with you; in dreams, I talk to you. In dreams, you're mine all of the time, we're together in dreams," she giggled.

"Am I supposed to know what that means?" I asked.

"It doesn't matter. We're not dreaming anymore, Twenty-One," she said. She picked up a few odd items on my desk - a pen, a stress ball, a small sac-bear that Ethan has given me as an office-warming present - and twirled them around in her fingers as though completely taken away with them.

"Why do you keep calling me Twenty-One, Claire?" I asked.

"Twenty men had tried to take him, twenty men had made a slip; twenty-one would be the ranger with the big iron on his hip."

"Are you calling me a ranger?" I asked, jokingly.

"I'm saying that Texas Red is a-comin' fer you, doctor, and it's going to be you or Ethan who makes the sacrifice!"

Her laugh made me feel cold and small.

"How do you know about Ethan? What do you know of me? Who are you, really?"

Joviality left, and her joyful eyes were fierce mirrors, reflecting some dark memory, some dark face in her mind. If I was doubtful that she needed my help five minutes ago, she'd done a terrific job of confirming Dr. Truman's suspicions.

"He showed me things... He took my little girl and made me watch as he did terrible things to her... He deceived me. He is evil. He is hate."

"Who is _He_, Claire?" I asked. "Who is this man you think has taken your daughter?"

"I don't know his name. I call him The Hunter," she said.

"Why do you call him The Hunter?" I asked.

"Because his entire life is devoted to seeking out people like me," she said. "He's the candy-colored clown they call the sandman, and he's been tip-toeing into my room every night for the past two years. He's a virus - an infection."

Claire began to giggle again, bighting her knuckles as she squeezed her eyes shut and laughed.

"But he's not my problem, not anymore. And now I can finally hear my Abby's voice again, my precious little angel... She's telling me that it's time to go home."

"Claire, where are you staying right now?" I asked. I reached for her file, trying to see if I could find the answer myself. I could have sworn it said that she was staying with a family member. The behavior she was displaying right now was no depression, this was clearly Psychosis. Claire had lost touch with reality sometime between the last session with Dr. Truman and now, and she needed to be observed.

"I want to place you under a 72-hour observation, just so that I can make sure that I know that I'm the right person to help you."

I looked up, but she was no longer sitting on the edge of my desk. Claire across the room, staring out of the floor-length window in the corner. It was as though I could sense what was going to happen next, I knew that some very horrible idea was dancing around inside her head right at that moment, but something held me in my seat, and I was forced to watch as she wrapped her silk scarf around her neck.

She began to dart for the window, and I finally pushed against the weight of the force that held me in my seat. I jumped up from my chair and scrambled over my desk. I reached out, but could not reach her. I closed my fist around her scarf.

the window shattered with the sound of a thousand clashing rings falling to the ground below. Claire let herself fall. But my grip on the scarf was tight, and I was pulled along with her. I fell to the floor, my lower torso and legs inside my office while my shoulders and arms were hanging out the window, holding onto her. And I felt a surge of tingles brush down my arms, the hairs along the way standing up on end as a sharp pierce dug deep into me chest. I felt the broken sharp in the window frame that I'd landed on cutting into the flesh between my ribs, deeper and deeper as each struggled kick from Claire shook my body. She hung below, her scarf a noose, and I tried to pull her up as best as I could, but I didn't have the strength to save her on my own. I called out for help, but the only people who came were down below, pointing and crying out.

It was watch her die at my own hands as the scarf tightened with each kick, bulging the blood vessels in her eyes and face, or let her fall. To let her drop was her only chance, even if there was only pavement and concrete below.

I let go of the scarf.

I closed my eyes to keep from seeing her hideous landing, no doubt painful even if she did end up dying. But I still heard the gasps from the people below. But I heard no harsh _thud_ that should have followed. I opened my eyes, and saw that those passersby had done their best to catch her, and they laid her out gently on the ground as they whipped out their phones and dialed the cops, and ambulances, and firetrucks, and every bright flashing light and blaring siren imaginable to make sure this would be a night that I would never forget.

I slowly pushed myself off of the sharp glass shard, feeling it slowly slip out of my body as a fiery sensation of pain scorched my back. It was a good three inches, and though I had just been stabbed in an area of my anatomy that could prove fatal within the next hour, I was at least grateful that the piece hadn't shattered inside of me. That wouldn't have helped my chances of survival.

My door was thrown open; Leslie ran inside, followed by the secretary and a couple of the other mental therapists on the floor.

"Jesus Fucking Christ!" Leslie said.

I leaned against my desk and placed a firm hand against the puncture wound to keep from getting a suction wound.

"Are you fucking okay?"

"Just make sure the paramedics know that I'm up here. Tell them that I have a penetrated chest wound, the object has been removed and I am bleeding profusely."

She nodded and rushed out the door, pushing through my growing crowd of onlookers, both doctors and patients. At least she seemed to understand that time was an important factor here. I was so calm and in control of my thoughts that no one else would probably understand how serious this was. I was bleeding internally. Each breath was agony, and I was beginning to feel a painful sensation on one side of my lungs, where the wound was, meaning I had probably punctured that lung. To the onlookers this probably just looked like a flesh wound, but to me this was life or death.

I pulled out my phone, because I needed to talk to Ethan. If I did die from this, the Shaun needed to be taken care of and arrangements would have to be made. Meaning I needed to get the word to him, and I only had so much time to get the word to him.

Then I began to chuckle, despite the pain and short breath. No signal.

I slowly sat onto the floor and leaned against my desk, resting my head against the cool metal as I stared ahead.

Shaun could take care of himself for the next three days until Ethan's flight came in and they were together again. I wasn't really worried about him. I was just... I don't know, I guess sad. I just assumed that I would be there to see him do all of the fantastic things I knew that he would accomplish one day. I'd been looking forward to seeing him graduate high school, go after his dreams and make his ambitions manifest, to see him get married some day... I guess I'd invested so much into the whole stepfather role that it was actually more painful to lose all of those moments than losing my life.

The paramedics did manage to get me into the ambulance. They cut off my (favorite) dress shirt, thought I supposed it didn't matter thanks to the hole that the glass had cut into it. As they snapped a heart-monitoring clip onto my finger and tended to my wound, my phone rang. I fished it out of my pocket.

Ethan. It was the middle of the night in Germany, I wondered what had prompted him to call me right at this moment, of all moments.

Despite the protests of the EMT's not to speak, I answered the phone anyway and held it up to my ear.

"Hey baby," I said.

"Good, you answered," Ethan said, sounding relieved. "What's all that noise?"

"TV," I lied. "What are you doing up so late?"

"It's ridiculous... I had a bad dream, and just needed to make sure you were all right," he said.

"I'm just fine, don't you worry about me," I said.

"I dreamt that this shadow just... smothered you out of existence. And I couldn't find you anywhere, no matter how long I searched for you, no matter where I looked."

"Ethan, it was just a dream. Just forget all about your worries and your dreams and get some sleep."

"I know... It's just good to hear your voice," he said. Honestly, it was good to hear his voice, too, and right now I could just bawl. But I bit my lower lip and held it all in. "Anyway, send Shaun my love. I can't wait to see the both of you."

"I'll tell him... I love you, Ethan."

"I love you, too," he said. And just like that, it was over. If I had to hear last words from Ethan, those were the ones to go with.

The heart monitor beeped slower and slower until all I heard was one flat tone. Despite my heart giving up and my consciousness slipping away, breath by breath, I was still aware of my surroundings as I stared up at the roof of the ambulance. They powered up the defibrillators and tried to jump start my heart again, a dangerous risk considering the open wound and the sharp muscle spasms the jolts made me do. But in the end, it was no use.

This was it. This was my story. It all ended here. I always thought that I'd go out in a blaze of glory. I never even got to say goodbye to Shaun. But this was the hand dealt to me, and for all the good I'd been given in the last four years, I couldn't complain.

I breathed the last breath of this life.

And then I drew in my first breath of new life. It was a new beginning. A new existence. A new calling.

A new danger.


	9. Chapter 9: Life Support

9. Life Support

I can't say I remember much. I remember voices and noises and random faces coming into view. I asked a man in white if this was what death felt like; he said this was what morphine felt like. And boy, was it something. It felt like a wave of warmth flowing through my veins and into my muscles, lifting me up into the air. I felt weightless, and free, and neither reality nor pain would break my surreal bubble.

But eventually my bubble dissolved on its own. I wasn't light and floating anymore, I felt heavy and gross, and helpless in a hospital gurney. The sting of an IV was still there, but the needle must have been taken out long ago. And as these warm feelings left me, the sharp, throbbing pain of my side wound began scratching and gnawing at my brain until I was fully aware of it. The nurse came by and caught me up to speed. It had only been just over twenty-four hours since the incident, and the surgery was minor. The puncture in the right lung was a clean enough slice that there shouldn't be any major complications healing, though that entire area of tissue wouldn't be able to begin processing oxygen again for a couple of weeks, which would lead to a feeling of shortness of breath. I was going to be on oxygen for a couple of weeks to help compensate for the wounded lung, but overall I was going to be okay.

"You're very lucky, Mr. Jayden; the glass missed a pulmonary artery by a fraction of an inch," he said as he patted my knee and left my room.

I was getting really tired of this brand of luck. I almost died chasing down Scott Shelby. I was sealed alive in a crate and dropped into a lake. I was nearly burned alive. And now I'd just been shanked by a window having a bad day. Oh, I was lucky all right, and it wasn't the good kind.

Footsteps echoed into my world and through the door. There was a light tap on my door. I looked up to see a man standing at the foot of my bed, draped in a long white coat and a clipboard clasped to his chest.

"I'm glad to see that you're awake, Mr. Jayden," he said. I didn't like how chipper he was after crashing from my morphine trip, and I really didn't like the fact that anyone with a comb over as bad as his could still be so cheerful.

"Are you the surgeon?" I asked.

"Me? Er - no, my name is Dr. Jacoby, I'm the chief of psychiatry. I'm here to talk to you about Claire Lynch," he said.

Oh, yes, the crazy broad that put me in here in the first place. I tried to sit up, but the pain in my side jolted and robbed my arms of their strength. I pushed through it, and eventually managed to sit upright. The nurse standing outside my room rushed in, alarmed.

"Sir, you should not be sitting upright yet!" She rushed to the bed and put her hands on my shoulder, but I swatted them away and ignored the gut-wrenching flare that burned inside my ribs.

"If you want to make yourself useful, go find me a steak," I said. She didn't seem to like that attitude, and stormed off spouting something about getting the doctor. "Please, have a seat, Dr. Jacoby."

"I would prefer to stand, thank you. This won't take long," he said.

"Tell me, how is Claire? I'd bet my right lung that she's not exactly happy that her episode didn't end the way she wanted it to," I said. Not that my right lung with me worth much damaged.

"She has gone into a state of catatonia. She hasn't responded to any form of stimuli since what happened in your office," he said. "I wanted to ask you what happened during that session. What might have been said or done to set her off into a suicidal frenzy."

"Honestly, I think that someone made a mistake. The Claire Lynch that was waiting for me in my office was not the same woman in her profile. I was supposed to meet a woman dealing with depression and child loss, and what I got was a psychotic woman with a suicidal plan that nearly killed me in the process. I don't have experience in the type of care that she needs, Doc."

"I contacted her previous caretakers, they informed me that she has never displayed this type of behavior, nor has she ever shown the capability to change her personality so rapidly," he said.

"I call bullshit; these types of changes don't occur overnight in a patient without manifesting some trace of schizophrenia, or any multiple personality disorders."

"I completely agree, I believe that her last doctors must have dismissed signs or symptoms or ignored them. I would like you to sign her over to my care so that I may evaluate her properly in a controlled environment."

"You don't need my signature," I said. She was not appointed to me by any legal office, and she was free game.

"I understand, but you see, Claire is still a citizen with full rights intact, and with such rights comes the privilege to choose her mental health specialist. And she insists on remaining under your supervision. However, if you were to sign an affidavit stating that you do not have the experience or proper facility to treat a woman as wounded and desperate as Claire, it would help move the legal process along so that I may get Claire legally committed to my ward. I assure you that my staff and I only have her best interests at heart, and we will do whatever it takes to get her the help she needs."

He sat the clipboard before me. I knew that she needed to be committed. Claire was a deeply disturbed woman, and Jacoby was exactly the type of professional who could help her. I took the pen into my fingers. It would only take one stroke, even a simple mark would suffice. But something about it felt wrong. There was a reason that Claire had come to me, there was a reason that she wanted to remain under my treatment after her suicide attempt. Being with Ethan, learning about his mental connection with the Origami Killer, and even Anna, had taught me that sometimes when someone tells you that there another man in their head, they may be telling the truth. There was a reason that Anna called me Twenty-One, there was a reason she warned me about this Hunter, and there was a reason that my gut was telling me not to sign.

"As much as I know that you want to help her, you need to think of what taking on this responsibility will mean to you, Claire, and even your family."

I had to give him that point; here I was again letting Ethan down, unable to be there for Shaun, putting myself in danger again. This was supposed to be an easy gig and yet there I was in the hospital.

I pressed the pen to the paper, and my wrist handled the rest as I signed out my signature. I handed it back to Jacoby, and even after signing Claire's life away I couldn't let go, but he managed to wrest it from my hand and that was the end of that.

"It's for the best, Mr. Jayden, it really is," he rubbed my shoulder understandably. He reached into his pocket and withdrew a small white card. "Here's my card, in case you ever feel the need to talk out some of your feelings about this... awful incident."

And just like that he was gone.

The slop from the cafeteria was about as soulful as the last popular single I heard on the radio. You know the one, it starts out like a thousand other songs that you've heard before, and it's just some Disney brat singing about how he's got no concept of love but he promises to love you forever, or some girl singing about how her vagina says yes but her heart says no. Shaun would blast the radio in his room and I would have to endure three minutes of Ke$ha singing about how many guys she let taste her yeast-infection in the club bathroom stall.

Maybe those young kids at my firm were right; maybe I am just getting old and grumpy.

Though the hospital insisted I stay a while longer (to bleed my insurance dry) I immediately gathered my things and checked myself out. Shaun was there with my car as soon as I called him, ready to take me home. He told me that he'd come up to see me last night, and I told him I remembered, even though I had no recollection of any of it. But I thanked him. He was a good sport about helping me inside the house. Breathing became too painful beyond a shallow breath, and walking was also a strain on the ribs. I never realized how much my stride would tug and pull at that particular tender touch of flesh and bone.

So, here I was, house bound. I called my boss, Dr. Alison Casey, and told her that I'd be in to work bright and early Monday morning. She insisted I take some time to heal, but honestly, the thought of spending my days alone and bored inside of this big house was worse than the idea of getting stabbed again on the other side.

I was surprised with a _Welcome-Home-Get-Well-Soon_ dinner by Shaun. Chicken Parmesan, and Fuck me Freddy, it was as good as my Ma's back in the day. We sat opposite one another, eating in silence.

"My dad's going to catch a flight tonight, he should be home tomorrow," Shaun said. "I'm going to the airport at 5 to pick him up if you want to go."

I nodded, thinking over what kind of lecture I'd get about being safe and doing crazy stunts to save people. He probably wouldn't be happy about having to duck out of his project a day early.

"Why do you do it?" Shaun asked. I glanced up, dumbfounded and more than a little confused. "What makes you put yourself in harm's way every chance you get to help people?"

"Instinct, I suppose," I said.

"I was expecting you to say something hokey, like _because it's the right thing to do_," he said, a small smirk playing on his lips. He was right, I was about to follow up with that excuse.

"I guess it's because I'd want someone to do the same if someone I cared about was in trouble. If someone was pointing a gun at you, I'd want someone to do whatever it took to protect you - even if that meant taking a bullet to the head. Because you've got so much life to live, so much talent to share, whereas a guy like me's already had my excitement."

"I wish you weren't so generous," Shaun said.

"Yeah, sometimes I wish I wasn't, too, buddy," I said. But that would never change. It was just a natural part of me, to help others. And when I saw them reunite with their loved ones again, more appreciative of the life they had and the people in it, that was thanks enough for me. But I'd learned that I couldn't be so brazen or très fou anymore, because I had people depending on me. People like Shaun. I thought about how badly it would hurt Shaun or Ethan if I'd died yesterday, wondered if they're grow as bitter as Gregory and Anna, trying to place their blame on someone else.

No, I knew Ethan, and I knew Shaun. They wouldn't ever blame anyone else for my choices.

"Anyway, tell me about what's been happening with you - how are things between you and uh, um..." Ah, geez - what was the damn girl's name? She'd been over here three times...

"Jessica," he said.

"Right, her... Things still good in paradise?" I asked.

"We broke up a month ago," he said.

I took a bite of chicken and glanced out the window to make the situation less awkward, but I'd heard his embarrassment in his tone.

"Is there someone new these days? Someone's been keeping you busy over the last week, I haven't had meals this good in a few days," I said. He laughed, but continued to play with the food on his plate.

"I've been dating someone, yeah," he said. "I guess I just... It's a weird situation. It's not something I'm used to, you know?"

"What, does she have a peg-leg or something?" I asked. The sour look on his face made me choke. "Wha - that was a joke, I didn't mean anything by it if she does."

"There's no peg-leg," Shaun chuckled. "I really like them, and I think they're a really great person. They're smart, and good looking, and they make me feel good about myself. But we've gotten some weird looks when we're together, and I don't know how they feel about it. I try to bring it up sometimes, but it's just so awkward to talk about... And I think their parents might not feel good about us being together either. I've even been wondering how you and dad would react if you met them..."

Couldn't say I blamed him. I mean, some relationships are unconventional, and it's just the way the world is. I remember Ethan telling me how strange it felt to be with me after years of being with Shaun's mother, Grace, and how he would get these little anxiety attacks when he would see other people staring at us in public places, or during parent/teacher confrences, or...

"Oh," I said. I put two and two together and stared at the young man across from me. He continued to stare down at his plate, and suddenly I felt like I didn't know him as well as I thought I did. Not in a bad way, like he'd suddenly changed, but in a way that he could still shock and amaze me, that he had such a clear perspective of himself and others and such a deep level of thought and emotion. He really did remind me so much of Ethan it made me feel some kind of soft, gooey warmth in my chest... I had to clear my throat and place my hands on the table to chase that weird feeling away and man up.

"Right, well, uh... You know, no matter who you decide to date, or what kind of man you choose to be, your dad will support you in everything. You know that, kiddo, you never have to worry about what he thinks of you. He's proud of you, always has been," I said.

"Yeah, I know, but... What about you?" He asked.

Me? What about me? Shaun looked up from his plate and right into my eyes, and that weird warm feeling came back, making my manly-pretenses crumble and opening me up like a window to let my emotions get some fresh air.

"What would you think if my choices weren't what you'd expected them to be? What if I didn't go in the direction you'd hoped I would go? Would you be disappointed in me?" He asked.

That had definitely caught me off guard. I guess I'd never really imagined Shaun seeking out my approval when it came to, well... Anything, really. He always worked so hard to make his dad proud, I just didn't really think that my opinion mattered. I was just there for him when I could be. But knowing that he thought of me and my approval as being on par with Ethan, well, that changed everything.

"Shaun, I'm going to level with you. I've never really been a man who's very open with my emotions, and if that's made you second guess how I feel about you, I'm sorry about that. I've never had a son, but when I look at you, watch you grow like I have over the last four years, I feel like I get to experience for those moments, no matter how brief or fleeting, that I'm the luckiest dad in the world to have a son like you. I love you. I would do anything for you - be anything you needed - in order to support and protect you. You never have to second-guess that. Everything I do is for you and your father. You're everything I have."

Shaun didn't say anything, he just looked at me as debates and facts whirled in that mysterious head of his, processing every word I'd just uttered. Then he pushed his plate aside and rose from his chair, walking right up to me and wrapping his arms around my shoulders and neck. Even though he was sixteen-years-old, getting closer to a man every day, moments like this made me feel like he was twelve years old again; so young, trusting, and naive, and still relying on me and Ethan to guide him. I guess part of him was.

I spent my evening sitting in bed flipping through channels, using my little oxygen tank when I felt particularly light headed or when I felt close to gasping for air. It felt like a pitiful existence. You'd think that I would have gotten used to being put out of commission - a year ago I was still in physical therapy to learn to walk without the cane I'd become dependent on. And even now, on the days when what feeling I had in my legs wasn't at its strongest sensitivity, I still pulled the aluminum third-leg out of the closet.

What Shaun had said about stepping back and letting someone else play the hero was beginning to sink in more and more. I looked at what kind of shape I was and how each new injury grew progressively worse and brought me closer to death. Maybe this body had done enough protecting for one lifetime and I really should retire from these impulses of saving others.

It was a 11:30. I pulled out my phone and dialed the number that I should have called more often.

"Norman?" The sound of his voice sent trills of joy down my spine. I closed my eyes to enjoy that symphonic tone, the voice of the man I loved as he said my name.

"Ethan, it's me," I said.

"What are you doing up? It's practically midnight there, you should be asleep - and you definitely shouldn't be talking right now, you should be giving your lung and diaphragm time to heal."

I laughed, and the pain brought tears to my eyes but I couldn't help it. It just felt so good to hear Ethan lecturing and worrying over me. I wasn't sure I'd ever hear his voice again.

"I just wanted to hear your voice," I said.

"I'm still mad at you for lying to me," he said, but his tone wasn't the least bit hostile. "You should have told me what happened when I called you."

"Would it have been any better? What could you have done but worry and feel helpless? You're across the ocean, there was nothing you could've done."

"You should have told me. When I think about you possibly dying while I was complaining about a bad dream..."

"But I didn't die, and I'm just fine. Surgeon said I would heal without any major complications, and I feel fit enough to go back to work on Monday."

"Jesus, Norman," he groaned. I heard that disapproving sigh, and couldn't help but chuckle again. "This is not funny - when are you going to think about what's good for you instead of what you want to do? You need to spend some time at home, not going back to work."

"I know it's not funny," I said, though I still couldn't wipe that big dopey grin off of my face. "I'm not making a joke out of it, I'm just happy... Happy that you still care about me enough to talk to me like an incompetent child."

"Maybe if you didn't act like one half of the time, I wouldn't have to."

"But I love it when you do," I said. I could practically see him smiling coyly on the other end of the line. "Promise me that you'll keep badgering and nagging me. Tell me what an idiot I'm being when I do things that I know I should. I don't know how I'd survive without it."

"That's a promise, now go to bed. I'll be boarding my flight within the next hour and I'll be seeing you soon," he said. The thought of seeing him again after he'd been gone for so many weeks immediately made me feel like I was on a morphine drip again, floating on air and not a care in the world. "I love you."

"Wait, wait, wait - I wanted to talk to you about something important," I said. "It's about Shaun."

"What about Shaun? Is he okay?"

"Well, physically he's fine, but I think he's in an emotional turning point... We had a pretty interesting conversation over dinner tonight."

"What about?" Ethan asked, suspicious as cat.

"He's dating someone new, someone he feels is very important to him," I said.

"Well, then, I can't wait to meet this girl," he said.

"That's just it, I'm not entirely certain it's a girl," I said. I heard that beat of silence on the other line, that pause that meant that Ethan was processing what I was telling him.

"No," he said in utter disbelief.

"I think the apple didn't fall far from the tree, Ethan."

"Did he explicitly _tell_ you that he was dating another boy?" He asked.

"Well, no, he didn't really say anything of the sort - but it was the _way_ he said it," I said. There were too many hints not to see what he was trying to tell me, it was obvious.

"I think you're imagining things," Ethan said.

"Do you want me to be?" I asked. Ethan was silent for a moment. "How would you feel if he was?"

"I don't know," he said. "I'd support him, of course..."

"You don't sound too convincing," I said. This wasn't exactly the kind of uncertainty I'd expected out of Ethan, not knowing how much he was always so unyielding when it came to loving his son.

"It's not what you think, it's just surprising, that's all. I just never really thought of Shaun loving the same gender, it just didn't seem like _him_. There were no signs, or tells."

"Well, I'm putting $50 on the nightstand, and if I'm wrong it's all yours," I said.

"And what if you're right?"

"We'll discuss the terms of your surrender when that fact is proven, and how you can make it up to me," I said.

I didn't sleep too well that night, I kept having this dream of being smothered when I couldn't breathe, and then I'd jolt up to a world of pain as my sudden movements put unwanted pressure on my wound. I stumbled blearily into the bathroom to change my gauze, and then had another oxygen session, trying to get used to the plastic tube around my ears and under my nose.

Come morning, Shaun was getting ready for his last day of school for the week. He scrambled up some eggs for me, and kept asking if I'd be fine by myself for the day. The kid was too much like his old man, and it took quite a bit of convincing for him to finally admit that I was a grown man who could take care of himself. Honestly, it was like I was a freaking toddler between these two. He patted my shoulder on his way out, and I was already wondering what the hell I was going to do to fill up my morning.

"Norman," Shaun called from the front door. "Norman, come look at this."

I groggily rose from my chair and stumbled through the living room to the front door, where Shaun stood in the doorframe staring suspiciously at the open door. When I stood at his side, I could see why he thought this was something worth checking out.

Red paint (at least, I was hoping it was paint) was smothered all over the white door, barely legible words scribbled along its length.

_Twenty-One, and strong as I can be_

_I know what freedom means to me_

_And I can't give the reason why_

_I should ever want to die_

I told Shaun not to worry about it and to run off to school. Neighbors were already stopping along the sidewalk as they jogged or walked their dogs, but I walked back into the house and closed the door. I dialed up the number on the little white card, and waited for the ringing to stop.

"This is Dr. Jocoby," he answered.

"Hey, Jacoby, it's Norman Jayden. Listen, was Claire under the supervision of your staff last night?"

"As a matter of fact, Ms. Lynch disappeared sometime last night after I went home, and she hasn't been seen since," he said. I noticed how carefully he selected his words, to brush the blame off of his shoulders and onto the staff at the hospital.

"Well, she came to my house last night and left a message for me," I said.

"Did you see her? How do you know it was Claire?"

"Because she left a pretty clear clue. I think she might come back tonight, so if you want to catch her that will probably be your best bet."

I hung up before he could reply. I didn't know how she found out where I lived, or what she wanted, but one thing was certain, and that was that I needed to stop playing the hero and just let the system do its job. Claire might have wanted my help, but I wasn't the man to give it to her. I just wanted to go back to being Norman Jayden, Family Man, not Norman Jayden, sleuth.

No matter how badly I felt inside about handing her over to Jacoby, I just couldn't get involved in anything that would put me or my family in danger.

AN: Yeah, slow chapter, nothing really plot related, but I just needed a chapter to get back into the swing of things and into some characters' heads.


	10. Chapter 10: Into The Night

10. Into The Night

I seemed to be the spectacle of the day as people drove by and honked. Neighbors who usually just waved would stopped and drop a few words just to get a look as I, in just my bath robe and a pair of jeans, scrubbed the hell out the door with a bucket of water and a loofah. The problem was that none of it was really coming off; the words had already stained, to now there were just pink smudges all over with slightly darker salmon letters. I finally gave up and decided it would just have to be painted over when I had the time (and energy) to do it myself.

It really didn't help me lay low among my neighbors once the cops came knocking on my door. Apparently the good Dr. Jacoby had taken the liberty of calling them up for me, so that they could look out for my best interests and file a complaint on my behalf. Of course that was the cover story; they were really there to survey and keep an eye out for any crazy woman who may be a danger to people while she was at large. To, they informed me that they would be back after dusk to stake out at the curb. As though that wouldn't be obvious to Claire. But hey, she was no longer my problem.

Shaun came home from school around three, and we immediately took off after I changed clothes to pick up Ethan when he touched down around five. The weather was wetter than usual, and on top of the heavy rain that streaked across the windshield and flooded the gutters, the traffic on the freeway was completely ridiculous. So there we sat at a dead standstill, with horns honking all around us to make my headache even worse, all the while my side felt like the glass shard was pressing its way into my body all over again as the wound throbbed.

"Norman," Shaun said, testing the waters. I glanced over, studying his body language out of habit; his hands gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white, and his heart pounded so hard that his neck throbbed with it. His breathing was heavy, and a sheen of cold sweat covered his forehead.

"What's on your mind, kiddo?"

"Hey, so... I was thinking about what you said last night. About, you know, being there and being supportive... How I never have to worry about you not judging me, or whatever?"

Oh, boy, was he eloquent when he wanted to be. "Of course. Is this leading somewhere?"

"Well, that someone I mentioned to you, the one I've been dating... Well, I talk about you and my dad all the time, and they said that they'd love to meet the two of you sometime. And, I mean, you two mean a lot to me, and I would like you to meet this other person who also means a lot to me..."

"Sure, you know that we always love meeting your friends - psychotic girls aside," I said. I immediately felt horrible for making that crack. Shaun never really got over Anna. In a way, thought she was only using him to get close to me, she was still one of the closest friends he'd ever had. I suppose that was understandable; he confided in her, told her things that he wouldn't normally tell anyone - probably not even his dad. They'd probably even shared a few tender kisses. And then in the end she ended up going insane and getting herself killed over revenge.

But Ethan had the worst of it. He'd blamed himself for Anna's death for a long time, and said that I just couldn't understand what she meant to him. He kept telling me that she was like him, and that he failed to protect her. He was right, I didn't understand, but I suppose that was something that he needed to work through on his own.

"Sorry, kiddo," I said.

"It's okay," he said, somberly.

"Anyway, any time you're ready to bring this _person_ home, the door's open. You know we'd never have it any other way."

I had to admit, I never really did know what to say in these scenarios between Shaun and I. But I usually just said what I'd always wanted to hear from my dad before he passed away, and that usually had Shaun feel safer, more secure about his place in our lives. Even now I could see him relaxing as his usual upbeat self came shining out of its hiding place.

"Good, because I kind of made plans for them to come over and have dinner with us tonight," he said. He glanced at me nervously, and saw my incredulous glare. "I'm sorry, it was a last minute thing and I really didn't want to let them down and I didn't think that it'd be a big deal..."

It wasn't really the last minute spring that I disliked, it was the fact that I wasn't really supposed to be handling a lot of stress at the moment, and I had a psychotic woman on the loose with a thing for me, I had Ethan coming home after being away for so long, and I had to deal with a police squad car parked right outside of our house, on top of trying to make a good impression on Shaun's behalf in the shape that I was in.

Sure, this was a wonderful time to have a dinner party.

We waited in the terminal for hours, and it wasn't until after six o'clock that Ethan finally came walking with his bags. The moment I saw him I felt this overwhelming sense of affection swallowing me, like tethers were latching onto him, pulling me closer. It felt like the night we first kissed in that dank motel room off the highway. I walked right up to him and took the bag off of his shoulder, ignoring the twinge of pain in my side. I looked into his soft, tired blue eyes and I didn't let him look away. I wanted to take in that beautiful soul staring back at me and savor the moment.

I placed my hand on his hip and pulled him right up to me, wrapping my other arm around his torso and clasped my lips to his. He wrapped his arm around my neck, and I felt him melt into me the way I always loved to feel. He even let a slight moan slip through his throat, and I held him even tighter.

Although this was my moment with the love of my life, the little slice of Heaven I'd been waiting for, I think I might have been putting on a bit of a show for Shaun's sake, too. I guess I really just wanted to show him that these were the ideals I wanted him to have: to love willingly, to love openly, and to always make sure that you never - _never_ - let your partner walk this road alone. You stand by them, and fuck what the naysayers shouted. Be your own man, Shaun.

I broke the kiss, and brushed my cheek against Ethan's, feeling a deeper sense of euphoria than the morphine could have ever given me. It was funny; when you're away from someone, you begin thinking that maybe things will be awkward when you're together again. But it was as though we'd never been apart.

"That was more of a welcome than I'd been expecting," Ethan said.

"Wait until I get you home; I'll show you how much I _really_ missed you," I whispered in his ear. He chuckled and stroked my head, until he remembered that his son was standing feet away and he suddenly flipped sides from my affectionate, fancy-free lover into the very bashful, conservative father he had always been around Shaun.

Ethan took the wheel, and Shaun explained that we had about two-hours until his special guest would arrive at 8:30, meaning that we had to make the house presentable and cook up some kind of meal by then. He said he'd already planned on Chicken Makhani, whatever the hell that was, and really only needed us to keep an open mind and be nice, for his sake. Ethan tried to fish out specific details about this individual we'd be meeting, but Shaun wasn't taking the bait. I was smirking in the passenger seat, very pleased with myself over having this bet in the bag. Ethan noticed, and kept tossing dirty looks my way, though I knew that they were playful.

When we arrived at the house, Ethan and Shaun immediately grabbed the luggage, leaving me a bit useless. When inside the house, they went to getting everything together father/son style, leaving me useless once again. Whenever I would attempt to help out, it was 'Oh, don't worry about it, just go relax and get some rest'. And, as annoying as that was, I didn't mind Ethan and Shaun catching up and having their moments together. I wasn't the only one who'd been missing Ethan in my life, Shaun's gap was just as great, if not deeper.

I made my way to the room to change clothes _yet again_, since Ethan seemed to think that my jeans and lounge shirt weren't presentable when it came to Shaun bringing home a date. It wasn't long before he joined me.

"Are you ready to surrender and accept defeat like a man?" I asked cockily.

"What are you going on about?" He asked.

"I'm talking about the likelihood that the person who walks through that door tonight being a boy; tell me you don't feel it coming," I said.

Ethan sighed as he slipped his shirt over his head and went fishing in his suitcase for a grey silk shirt and an amber tie. He sat down on the edge of the bed and stared ahead.

"What if it is?" He asked, though I didn't think it was really meant for me. "I mean, what if he has been seeing another boy? Is he just experimenting, do you think it could just be a phase that we brought on? What if we've really confused his sexuality while he's been developing as an individual?"

"Ethan, you're really placing too much blame on yourself," I said. I sat down beside him, slowly, and then relaxed against him. "And I get it; you're a parent. You're afraid that you're not setting the right examples, or that you might have influenced this side of him when that's not really how it works. If this is a part of him then it was there before you could have known, and only Shaun can decide who Shaun is."

He laid back onto the bed, and I laid beside him. He curled into me and I wrapped my arm around him, reveling in this moment together.

"I kept thinking about that dream. What would I have done if you had died in that hospital bed, and I never got a chance to be there with you because I was on another continent?"

"But I didn't, and you're here now," I said.

"This time; what about the next time?" He asked.

"Are anticipating a next time?"

"Knowing you?" I think he meant it jokingly, but I don't think either of us really took it as one. "I just mean that bad things happen to good people every day, and my biggest fear is that something will happen to you or Shaun and I'll never be able to change the fact that I wasn't there."

"You have a company to shoulder. You're an important man, and sometimes that means having to be apart from your family. These are _your_ words I'm repeating, here," I said. He pressed himself into my side, his head resting on my chest, and I could feel his body convulsing against mine. I shushed him as his tears seeped into the black shirt I'd slipped around my shoulders but had yet to button up.

"Then I was wrong," he said. He looked up at me, and though his lashes were clumped and stuck together with tears, his eyes rang through, true, right into me. "I hate being away from you and Shaun, and every time I leave it feels even longer than the last time. They want me to leave again next Thursday, and to be honest I don't know if I have the heart to do it."

"What about Scholermann?" I asked.

"I've been thinking about something, something big that I need to discuss with you," he said. He leaned in and kissed me, and I cupped his face and relished the taste of him after being deprived of Ethan for what felt like a century. He leaned a little too far, and his arm pressed against my side. I gasped sharply and bit my bottom lip as he pulled away.

"Sorry!" He jumped off of me and hovered at my side, unsure of what to do. And despite the pain, I thought that he looked so cute with that hint of anxiety that I couldn't help but smile at him.

"Ethan Mars, I never get tired of telling you how much I love you," I said.

"I never get tired of hearing it - now get dressed, we have about ten minutes before Shaun's big revelation arrives," he said.

I buttoned up my shirt, tucked it into my slacks, looped my belt, and was ready for an evening full of efforts to smile and stay awake. I began feeling a little short of breath, so I sat on the edge of the bed and hooked up to an oxygen tank, breathing in until I felt a little more stable. I heard the doorbell, and suddenly a dam broke within me, flooding my nerves with apprehension. I turned off the oxygen and unwrapped the tubes from around my head, making my way downstairs. Shaun was already heading for the door as I entered the dining room where Ethan was already setting the table.

We froze as soon as Shaun stepped into the doorway, looking right at him.

"Dad, Norman, this is the person I'd like you both to meet," Shaun said. He stepped aside, and reached out beside him. A hand appeared in his, and he gently led this person into the dining room.

This person was... Well, the first observation was that they were definitely female. She was a girl of a slight frame, with deep rosy brown skin and long, black hair tied back.

"This is Lana," Shaun said. "Lana, this is my father and his partner."

"I'm so excited to meet you, Shaun talks about the two of you all the time," she said.

The first thing I noticed about her was that she didn't exactly look _at_ me, but rather _through_ me. Blind, I quickly realized. Ethan walked up to her and took her hand, guiding her to the table.

"I'm just as excited to meet you. Any girl who can make my son as happy as you have is always someone worth meeting," Ethan said, laying on his natural charms.

"Please don't take this the wrong way, but... How exactly did you get here?" I asked. Shaun shot me a dirty look, but I shrugged; I was just curious...

"My sister dropped me off and she'll be back to pick me up at ten," she said.

"She was more than welcome to join us," Ethan said.

"She had her own plans, and this worked out better for the both of us," she said.

"Norman, can I talk to you for a second?" Shaun asked. I followed him into the living room, and though I was expecting a lecture for bringing up the blind elephant in the room, instead he sat down as though the strength had left his legs and he looked up at me like a child who'd been caught red-handed in the cookie jar.

"So?" He asked. "What do you think? What do you think my dad thinks?"

"I think you brought home a girl?" I offered. "What was I supposed to think?"

"She doesn't bother you?" Shaun asked.

"Well, she's only just got here. Give her a chance to get annoying first, and then ask me," I said.

"Are you... surprised?" He asked.

"Quite frankly, yes; I thought you were going to walk into that room with another boy at your side," I said. Shaun's face contorted in an odd fashion as that thought passed through his brain. He'd probably never even thought about it before.

"I'm not..."

"We can see that," I said. I sat down in the chair opposite the couch and placed my hands in my lap. "Shaun, what is this really about?"

His shoulders slumped, and he stared at the coffee table.

"I met her when my school volunteered at the blind school for a week to learn about helping others and leadership. And... Me and Lana kind of just..."

"I get it, you two just get each other," I said.

"Well, things were going great. I'd never met a girl like here. She said she wanted me to meet her parents," he said. That's when I could see the trouble in this story was about to begin. "So... I did. And they seemed nice in front of her, but then... Well, her father pulled me aside and said that I was wasting my time. That things weren't going to go anywhere between us because... we were... different..."

"That she's blind and you happen to see?" I asked.

"No, because... our skin colors don't happen to match," he groaned, annoyed.

If I'd been drinking coffee, I'd have spat it out.

"Really? _That's_ what this is about? The color of her _skin?"_ I asked.

Wasn't that a twist? The black girl's parents didn't want her dating a boy based on his race. If it was opposite day, someone forgot to give me the memo.

"So you thought that it might be a problem for us?" I asked tepidly.

"Well, normally I wouldn't have. I mean, I'd never thought about it before. She was just a girl, my friends were just friends. But once her dad brought it up, I started wondering how many people felt the same way. Every time we'd get a sideways glance when we were out at the mall or at the park, I was always wondering if it was because she was blind, or because of the color of our skin?"

Poor guy, he'd had it rough. He was a normal kid, raised not to see race, and then someone just had to put that obstacle in his path.

"Have you talked about how you feel to with Lana?" I asked.

"How do you bring up race to a girl who's been blind since she was a baby?" He asked. Well, he had a point there.

"Shaun, I don't know what her dad's problem is, but I do know one thing; you are one of the most decent, kindhearted human beings I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. You are incredibly wise and insightful for a kid your age, and this Lana girl seems to be good for you. If this is really what you want, then you know that your dad and I are right behind you. Her dad might not like it, but he'll come around or risk losing her forever. Do what makes you happy, Shaun."

"Thanks, Norman," he said, his mood immediately rising.

Then I narrowed my eyes and leaned in closer. "I'm guessing, based on what you've told me, that her parents don't know that she's here. In fact, I'll bet that her sister's covering for her so that she can go off and do whatever she wants until she picks Lana up."

Shaun nodded dourly.

"Please don't tell my dad; he'd flip out if he knew," he said.

"You're right, he would. I promise that your secret is safe with me as long as you promise not to think we're some pair of bigots from now on. I mean, Shaun; your dad and I aren't exactly the model couple that people want to expose their families to. Why on Earth would we ever think less of you and Lana?"

"I know, I should have known better, and for that I'm sorry," Shaun said. I leaned back in my chair, a little too quickly.

"You should get back to the dining room, your gal is waiting on you and if Ethan starts talking architectural history he might chase her off."

Shaun wasted no time jumping out of his chair and rushing off to the dining room. They'd have to do without me for a moment until I could muster up the willpower to get out of my comfortable chair - particularly when it felt so damn good to just lounge there for a few moments. Unfortunately a few moments of rest turned into a nap. The next thing I know, I'm being nudged awake by my knight in silky armor.

I jolted upright, but Ethan eased me back into my chair and sat on the arm.

"Don't worry, you don't have to move," he said.

"What about Lana?" I asked.

"I explained to her what you've been through and why you wouldn't be joining us for the rest of the evening. It's all right, she understood," Ethan said. "She's been gone an hour already."

He stroked my hair and gazed down at me in a way that made me feel so safe, so secure, and more than that, completely loved. What I saw in Ethan's eyes was a mirror of the way I looked at him sometimes; cherished and treasured.

The doorbell rang, and the moment vanished. I sat up as Ethan rose.

"I've got it," Shaun said. He walked through the living room, dish towel slung over his shoulder, and seemed to be in a much better mood than he'd been in all day.

"So, it seems that I've won your bet," Ethan said.

"There's salt in the kitchen if you want to rub that into the wound as well, funny man."

"I've been thinking it over and I don't think I want to take the $50," he said. "No, I think I'd rather just cash in for a foot rub and breakfast in bed."

"Deal," I said.

"Norman," Shaun's head poked around the corner and into the living room. "It's for you, says her name is Leslie."

"Yep, that would be for me," I said. I sat up, and Ethan helped me out of the chair and onto my feet. Shaun stepped aside and in stepped Leslie, looking around the living room like she'd never seen a house before.

"Nice place," she said. "Between paying off my student loan and the office rental at the firm, I barely afford my apartment."

She smiled when she saw me, and then studied Shaun from the floor up when he walked by.

"This your kid?" She asked.

"Well, he's, uh-"

"Yep, this is my dad," Shaun said. "I'm Shaun."

"Did you know your old man's a fucking superhero?" She asked as she shook Shaun's hand.

"I'm usually reminded when he does something stupid," he said. I didn't miss the side glance he gave me, either, that sarcastic brat.

Leslie's eyes looked right through us at Ethan, waiting expectantly. I had almost forgotten that he was there. I guess I was used to it just being Shaun and I for a while that him standing quietly to the side would take some getting used to.

"Right, sorry - this is Ethan, Shaun's actual father," I said.

She leaned forward and shook his hand.

"Leslie Brigg, I work with Mr. Jayden," she said. "So that who dad thing was a joke?"

"No, I'm Heather and I have two mommies," Shaun said dryly. "I'm going up to my room, you two can have fun cleaning the rest of the kitchen."

He tossed the dish rag at Ethan and darted up the stairs and out of sight. I chuckled, glad that he was finally acting like his old self again, but stopped as soon as I looked at Leslie and saw the way she was looking at Ethan, and then me.

"So, he's not your neighbor, or a friend...?" She asked.

"No, Ethan's my partner," I said. "We met six years ago when I was working the Origami Killer case."

"You're not Ethan Mars, are you?" She asked. Ethan smiled and tilted his head. "Holy fuck-balls, I know that case detail by detail. You were willing to drink a fucking vial of poison to save your son."

"He was a big part of helping me find the Barbershop Killer," I said.

As fascinated as she seemed to be with serial killer cases, a shadow covered her eyes as that strange, uncomfortable look returned to her face.

"Look, I'm sorry I just dropped in on you, it was a bad time and a stupid idea. I just wanted to make sure that you were all right, and you are, so I'll be going," she said.

"Well, I can show you out," Ethan said.

"No - thanks, but the front door's just ten feet away, I'll be fine," she said. She shoved her hands into her pockets and turned her back to us, walking hastily out of the room and through the front door.

"Wow," Ethan said, staring after her. "She's certainly..."

"A sailor's daughter," I said.

"Spirited was the word I was going for," Ethan said. "And I thought you had the worst mouth I'd ever heard."

I glanced through the blinds on the front window and saw her in her little Dodge Shadow, trying to get the car to start. The windows were up, but I could see her mouth as she shouted out words I was sure I didn't want Shaun hearing. The police squad car was parked across the street, though I couldn't see the faces of the officer(s) inside.

"Well, I think we can agree that the evening is done for, and I am ready to call it a night," Ethan said. I was still peering out the window when I felt his fingers on my chin, guiding my eyes to his. "Care to join me in the shower?"

"I think I'd better go talk to Leslie," I said. Her car looked like it needed a jump, and she poor girl looked like she didn't take meeting Shaun and Ethan well. At the very least I had to make sure that there wasn't going to be a problem with our professional relationship come Monday.

Ethan slipped his tie from around his neck and began unbuttoning his shirt, at first only exposing a few hairs on his chest until the shirt was undone. He spread the shirt apart, exposing his chest, his stomach, and the lean muscular curves and contours that his tight skin draped like a sheet over sensual forms. He took a step closer, just inches away.

"Are you sure?" He asked. I bit my bottom lip, thinking about how long I'd been waiting for this night together.

"Give me five minutes and I'll be upstairs," I said.

"All right, five minutes, but any longer and I'm going it solo," he chuckled. He leaned in and kissed my cheek before making his way upstairs, but his stimulating scent lingered like a heady cloud. I had to force my thoughts to focus on Leslie.

I walked out the front door and across the lawn to the sad lemon at the curb. She kept trying to get the engine to start, but each attempt proved fruitless. She jumped at the sound of me tapping on her window, and reluctantly rolled it down.

"I'm just trying to get this stupid car to start, but the fucking engine won't turn!" She said. I knelt beside the car and rested my arms on the door.

"You want to talk about what just happened?" I asked.

She sighed and put her hands on the steering wheel. "It's not something I like saying out loud, and especially to your face."

"Listen, if my family bothers you, that's on you, and I'm not here to change your mind. I just want to make sure my personal life won't affect my professional life because you have a problem with it," I said.

"Look... My dad was a cop. My uncles are cops. My older brother is a cop. The whole fucking Brigg family tree is filled with law enforcement all the way to its roots. And I guess because you'd always walked around the firm with that same macho-tough-guy persona that I was used to, I... I think I might have just got my wires crossed, and I'd like to let it drop and leave."

Funny, coming from a cop family I had to wonder when Lauren Winter decided prostitution was the next tradition to bring to the table. Then I leaned my head to the side and smiled as I put all of her clues together.

"Leslie Brigg, do you have a crush on me?"

"Fuck no!" She said.

As hard as I tried to fight the smug smirk on my lips, I just stared at her cute little blush and sighed.

"Look, I am completely flattered - I really am," I said.

"Just... shut the fuck up and stop giggling like a fucking school girl," she said, hanging her head and staring at her lap. "I'm sorry if I got weirded out, I just had this idea of you built up in my head. I mean, that's why it took three months for me to finally talk to you... You know how they say _don't meet your heroes_?"

"Yeah... Usually good advice to hold onto," I said. "I'm sorry that I disappointed you, but you have to understand that I'm just a regular man. A man who's worn, and tired."

"Yeah, well... Have a good weekend," she said. She twisted her keys, and the car started with a deep roar. The headlights flashed onto a figure standing in the road.

Claire Lynch stood staring right back at us, draped in a dirty, grimy hostipal gown and her red pea coat around her shoulders.

"What the fuck is Crazy McQueen doing standing in the road?" Leslie asked.

"Claire," I said, standing up slowly and putting my hands up. "Claire, what are you doing here?"

"He didn't leave like he promised he would - he didn't go away!" She cried. She stumbled forward with uneven steps, and held up a knife, darkened by the blood that covered its blade.

I glanced at the police car, still too dark to see inside, but if they were inside I didn't know what the hell they were waiting for.

"All I want is to see my baby girl, don't you understand!" Clair held the knife up to her neck, her fist trembling.

"Claire, don't move; just put the knife down," I said.

"I try and I try, but he won't let me do it," she sobbed. She lowered the knife and dropped her hand to her side.

"Claire, listen to me; I'm going to help you. I promise that I will help you."

"He breaks us down and uses us, and he won't stop; he'll never stop," she said. Her eyes slowly grazed over my house, and she turned her shoulders toward it. "But I can stop the cycle before he can start again... I can put a stop to this..."

Clair set out at a run and I chased after her, the wound on my side pulling and searing with pain as I did. I heard Leslie get out of her car, but I didn't have time to be bothered with whatever she was up to; there was a mentally unhinged woman heading for my house, where Ethan and Shaun would be totally unsuspecting. She ran up the front steps and twisted the doorknob, but I grabbed her ankles. She tripped forward into the house.

"Ethan!" I called. I hoped he'd hear me, that he wasn't already in the shower. "Ethan, get Shaun and lock the bedroom door!"

Our bedroom door was the only room with a lock on it; Shaun would be defenseless if he was in his room. I looked up just as Ethan appeared at the top of the stairs, peering down at my struggle with the woman who seemed to want us all dead.

"Go!" I shouted. Claire kicked my jaw, but I grabbed her waist as she crawled to her feet. She twisted and shoved her knee into my ribs, right into my wound. I fell back onto the floor and bit down on the inside of my jaw so hard that I could taste blood. I pushed myself up to sit against the wall, and even that was agony.

"She's coming!"

I heard a door slam shut, and it wasn't our bedroom door just at the top of the stairs. They were in Shaun's room, I knew it. Claire pounded on the door in a fit of rage, screaming and shouting like a mad siren. If Ethan was pressing his back against to door to keep her out, then she need only plunge the knife into the door to harm him, and that thought was the only thing that allowed me to get to my feet.

Leslie ran through the front door and came to my side to help keep me upright.

"Where the fuck is she?" She asked.

"Upstairs," I gasped. "She's upstairs."

"Those fucking cops outside? Dead - both of them. She went to fucking town on their faces with that knife, they don't even look human anymore!"

She helped me get my arm around her shoulder, and together we rushed up the stairs - at least, as quickly as my body would allow me. At the top of the stairs, staring down the hall at Claire Lynch as she clawed at the door, I fell to my knees when Leslie let go of me.

"Drop the knife, you psycho bitch!" I looked up and saw Leslie pointing a gun at the crazed woman.

"Why the hell do you have a gun?" I couldn't help asking, it just fell out of my mouth as I used the wall to stand up. The pain in my side was ebbing away very slowly, just enough to put strength back into my legs.

"I took it off of one of those dead cops - does it really matter right now?"

"Maybe you should hand it to me," I said.

"Fuck that - you're in no fucking shape to be handling a fucking gun right now!"

Leslie began edging closer to Claire, who immediately held up the knife.

"Stay the hell away from me!" Claire hissed.

"Lady, you'd better put that knife down or I'm taking it out of your hands myself," Leslie said, eyes set and fist firm around the handle of the 9mm pistol.

I looked into Claire's eyes, those glass doll's eyes that I remembered in my office the first day I saw her. It was as though she wasn't really seeing the world that we saw, like reality was just a distant shadow to her.

She raised the knife and charged; Leslie pulled the trigger and a bright flash swallowed the entire hall.


End file.
